
(lass 



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•RESENTED l!V 



BIOGRAPHICAL 



SKETCHES 



OF 



Distinguished Marylanders, 



BY ESMEKALDA BOYLE, 

Author of Thistle- Down, Felice, and Songs of tlie 
Land and Sea. 




BALTIMORE: 

KELLY, PIET & COMPANY, 

174 W. Baltimore Street, 

1877, 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 187? , by 

KELLY, Piet & Co. 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D. C. 



Gift 




*/s. t7/k^> 



7 SEP 1906 



TO THE 



tate of Maryland 



This Book is Dedicated, 



PREFACE 








N these sketches are embraced only a few of 
the many Marylanders whose acts have gone 
far towards establishing the greatness of our 
country. Yet through this small volume the 
author hopes that the soldiers, statesmen, and singers 
of " The Old Land " may become familiar as household 
friends to the children of their native State. Let us 
never be so ungrateful as to forget those whom we should 
first remember — the men and women whose illustrious 
names glorify the pages of our history. 

In the material furnished to the present writer, only 
the true worth of great actions was considered. It is 
not incumbent upon an author to make laborious 
search for the petty weaknesses or greater faults com- 
mon to all humanity. The better work is to discover, 
as clearly as possible, those nobler traits of soul that 
elevate men and women to a standard that inspires rev- 
erence towards our heroes and heroines of History. 
When in daily life we are familiar with sorrow wrought 
through the words or acts of evil-intentioned " mischief 
makers," how earnestly should we guard from slander 
the names of those whose fame we love. 

We should rejoice that in this century the story of 



b PREFACE. 

the great Dulany has again been found and rescued 
from the dust. The two letters from George Washing- 
ton to Governor Johnson, contained in these pages, have 
never before been published. This work, done for old 
Maryland's sake, has brought its own reward and com- 
fort to the writer. If, while referring with proud satis- 
faction to the deeds of our acknowledged great ones, 
we would sometimes remember the unnamed valor of 
untitled lords, it would be well. Not far need we seek, 
perhaps, an "inglorious Milton:" 

Some silent, uncrowned poet 
Upon whose unknown grave, 
No fame-bestowing laurels 
Their gracious homage wave. 

Where no unsullied marble 
Doth mark the hallowed ground, 
Within whose heart unuttered 
Is grief the most profound. 

Where Spring's first roses scatter 
Their perfume, sweet and wild, 
About the earthly temple 
Of Nature's cherished child. 



E. B. 



June 24th, 187G. 



THE 

Thanhs of ths Author 

ARE DUE FOR ASSISTANCE IN THIS "WORK TO 

George Delany, Chevalier de St. Maurice and St. Ligmas,d'Italia, 

Dublin, Ireland; The Hon. Judge Pinkney, Baltimore; 

The Hon. Montgomery Blair, of Montgomery County ; 

General Benjamin Alvord, Paymaster-General of 

the United States Army; The late Reverdy 

Johnson, LL. D. ; Samuel Tyler, LL. D., 

Georgetown, D. C; Otho Holland 

Williams, Esq., Baltimore ; H. M. 

Fitzhugh, Esq., Bay City, 

Mich. ; James M. Garnet, 

President of Saint 

John's College, 

Annapolis, 

AND OTHERS. 



AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 




R. BANCROFT, the historian, says: "The 
mild forbearance of a Proprietary adopted 
religious freedom as the basis of the State." 
McMahon says, in his " History of Mary- 
land : " " The Freemen of Maryland, as they were 
called, were emphatically so from their origin. They 
never permitted the Proprietary to entrench upon what 
they considered to be their rights ; and the records of 
this period furnish many instances in which they op- 
posed and defeated the designs of the Proprietaries." 

The first of every land in all the world 
Where love of G-od, in peace, each creed defined, 
And freedom of the heart was certified 
By freedom of the mind ! 

Where Christian, each, might worship as he willed, 
Where temples throning different faiths arose, 
Where bigot and where martyr, side by side, 
Were shielded from their foes ! 



From the Charter of Maryland, granted by King 
Charles the First, of England, it is evident how Mary- 
land and her children were esteemed by that monarch, 
though he was a Protestant, and the recipients of his 
bounty Catholics : " Whereas, our right trusty, and well 



10 AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 

beloved subject, Cecilius Calvert, Baron of Baltimore, 
in our Kingdom of Ireland, son and heir of Sir George 
Calvert, Kt., late Buron of Baltimore, in the same King- 
dom of Ireland, pursuing his father's intentions, being 
excited with a laudable and pious zeal for the propaga- 
tion of the Christian faith, and the enlargement of our 
empire and dominion, hath humbly besought leave of 
us, by his industry and charge to transport an a mple 
colony of the English nation unto a certain country 
hereafter described, in the parts of America, not yet 
cultivated and planted, though in some parts thereof 
inhabited by certain barbarous people having no knowl- 
edge of Almighty God." 

And again, in reference to the "remote country" 
among "barbarous nations:" "Therefore, we have 
given, and for us, our heirs and successors, do give 
power by these presents, unto the now Lord Baltimore, 
his heirs or assigns, by themselves or their captains, or 
others, their officers, to levy, muster and train, all sorts 
of men, of what condition, or wheresoever born, in the 
said province of Maryland for the time being, and to 
make war and to pursue the enemies and robbers afore- 
said, as well by sea as by land, yea, even without the 
limits of the said province, and (by God's assistance) to 
vanquish and take them, and being taken, to put them 
to death by the law of war, or to save them at their 
pleasure ; and to do all and everything which unto the 
charge and office of a captain-general of an army be- 
longeth, or hath accustomed to belong, as fully and 
freely as any captain-general of an army hath ever had 
the same." 

And again: "Furthermore, that the way to honors 
and dignities may not seem to be altogether precluded 
and shut up to men well born, and to such as shall 
prepare themselves unto this present plantation and 



AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 1 1 

desire to deserve well of us, and our kingdoms, both in 
peace and war, in so far distant and remote a country; 
Therefore we, for us, our heirs and successors, do give 
free and absolute power unto the said now Lord Balti- 
timore, his heirs and assigns, to confer favors, rewards 
and honours, upon such inhabitants within the prov- 
ince aforesaid, as shall deserve the same; and to invest 
them with what titles and dignities soever as he shall 
think fit, (so as they be not such as are now used in 
England.") And further on occurs the following: — 
"we give and grant license unto the said now Lord 
Baltimore and his heirs to erect any parcel* of land 
within the province aforesaid into manors, and in every 
of the said manors to have and to hold a Court Baron 
with all things whatsoever which to a Court Baron do 
belong, and to have and to hold view of Frank-Pledge 
(for the conservation of the peace and the better gov- 
ernment of those parts) by themselves or their stewards, 
or by the lords for the time being of other manors to be 
deputed, when they shall be erected: And in the same, 
to use all things belonging to View of Frank-Pledge, 
and further, our pleasure is, and by these presents for 
us, our heirs and successors, we do covenant and grant 
to and with the said now Lord Baltimore, his heirs and 
assigns ; that we, our heirs and successors, shall at no 
time hereafter, set or make, or cause to be set, any impo- 
sition, custom or other taxation, rate or contribution 
whatsoever in or upon the dwellers and inhabitants of 
the aforesaid province, for their lands, tenements, goods 
or chattels, or in or upon any goods or merchandizes 
within the said province, or to be laden or unladen 
within any of the ports or harbours of the said province ; 
and our pleasure is, and for us, our heirs and success- 
ors, we charge and command, that this our declaration 
shall be henceforward from time to time received and 



12 AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 

allowed in all our courts, and before all the judges of 
us, our heirs and successors, for a sufficient and lawful 
discharge, payment and acquittance ; commanding all, 
and singular, our officers and ministers of us, our heirs 
and successors, and enjoining them upon pain of our 
high displeasure, that they do not presume at any time 
to attempt anything to the contrary of the premises, or 
that they do in any sort withstand the same, but 
that they be at all times aiding and assisting, as is 
fitting, unto the said, now Lord Baltimore, and Ms 
heirs, and to the inhabitants and merchants of Mary- 
land aforesaid, their servants, ministers, factors, and 
assigns, in the full use and fruition of the benefit of 
this our Charter." 

That all doubts and restrictions interfering with the 
future prosperity of Maryland should be rendered im- 
practicable barriers, the Charter concludes in thiswise: 
"If perchance hereafter it should happen that any 
doubts or questions should arise concerning the true 
sense and understanding of any word, clause or sen- 
tence contained in this our present Charter, we will 
ordain and command, that at all times, and in all 
things, such interpretation be made thereof, and al- 
lowed in any of our courts whatsoever, as shall be 
judged most advantageous and favourable unto the 
said now Lord Baltimore, his heirs and assigns. Pro- 
vided always, that no interpretation be admitted thereof, 
by which God's holy and truly Christian religion, or the 
allegiance due unto us, our heirs and successors may in 
any thing suffer any prejudice or diminution." 

This grant witnessed and signed at Westminster, the 
20th day of June, 1632, was executed for the benefit of 
Cecilius Calvert, first Lord Proprietary and Governor of 
the State of Maryland, and the second Lord Baltimore, 
son of Sir George Calvert, who was created Lord Balti- 



AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 13 

more by James I of England, on the 20th day of 
February, 1624. 

Lord Baltimore, George Calvert, was born in York- 
shire in 1582. When quite young he became the Sec- 
retary of Sir Robert Cecil, through whose influence and 
recommendation he afterward obtained the position of 
Clerk to the Privy Council. He finally rose to the 
office of Secretary of State to King James I. In 1624, 
he became a convert to the Roman Catholic faith. 
♦"Moved by conscientious scruples he determined no 
longer to hold the office of Secretary of State, which 
would make him, in a manner, the instrument of perse- 
cution against those whose faith he had adopted, and 
tendered his resignation to the King, informing him 
that he was now become a Roman Catholic, so that he 
must be wanting to his trust or violate his conscience 
in discharging his office." Not long after his resigna- 
tion he was created Lord Baltimore of Baltimore in 
Ireland. The persecution of the Catholics in England 
at this time was so cruel that they longed for a refuge 
from the storm. This Lord Baltimore sought and 
obtained for them through his gracious intercession 
with the King. A grant was made, and the form pre- 
pared by Lord Baltimore only awaited the great seal as 
its mark of verity when he died. George Calvert pos- 
sessed that true greatness of mind and soul which can 
only be the inheritance of the good. So profound was 
his wisdom that he sought by the means of peace and 
justice alone to forward and accomplish the happiness 
of those intrusted to his care, and subject to his rule. 
So broad was his liberality that he looKed above that 
miserable bigotry which is the breeder and disseminator 
of distrust, tyranny, and persecution. So pure were his 
principles that he desired, the elevation and mainte- 

*McSherry. 



14 AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 

nance of truth in all high offices of trust and dignity 
within his control. 

His son and successor, Cecilius, the Second Lord 
Baltimore, fitted out two vessels bearing the suggestive 
names of the " Ark " and " The Dove," and under the 
command of his brother, the Honorable Leonard Cal- 
vert, a party of emigrants departed for the shores of 
America. They set sail from Cowes, in the Isle of 
Wight, England, on the 22nd day of November, in the 
year 1638. It was Saint Cecilia's day, and Father An- 
drew White says: "After committing the principal 
parts of the ship to the protection of God especially, 
and of His most Holy Mother, and St. Ignatius, and all 
the guardian angels of Maryland, we sailed on a little 
way between the two shores, and the wind failing us, 
we stopped opposite Yarmouth Castle, which is near 
the southern end of the same island (Isle of Wight). 
Here we were received with a cheerful salute of artillery." 
*The ship spoken of is supposed to have been the Ark, 
as the Pinnace was the Dove, Father White tells of a 
storm that overtook the Ark on the broad bosom of the 
deep, and of the consternation of the sailors. In the 
midst of the angry waves and winds he remembered the 
One of whom it is written :f " Rising up. He rebuked the 
wind, and said to the sea: Peace; be still. And the 
wind ceased ; and there was made a great calm." He 
sought refuge and assistance in prayer, and relating this 
in the simple language of his faith, he says : " I had 
scarcely finished when they observed that the storm 
was abating. That, indeed, brought me to a new frame 
of mind, and filled me at the same time with great joy 
and admiration, since I understood much more clearly 
the greatness of God's love toward the people of Mary- 



Bancroft, f St. Mark, Chap. IV., 39 verse. 



AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 15 

land, to whom your Keverence has sent us. Eternal 
praises to the most sweet graciousness of the Re- 
deemer ! ! " 

As the principal portion of the crew was Roman 
Catholic, they consecrated their landing by the sacra- 
fice of the Mass. On page 33, of the journal of the 
missionary Priest above quoted, is the following beau- 
tiful passage: "After we had completed the sacrafice, 
we took upon our shoulders a great cross, which we 
had hewn out of a tree, and advancing in order to the 
appointed place, with the assistance of the Governor 
and his associates, and the other Catholics, Ave erected a 
trophy to Christ the Saviour, humbly reciting, on our 
bended knees, the Litanies of the Sacred Cross, with 
great emotion." In this narration of events, which is 
evidently intended as a record of the Catholic Missions 
in Maryland, the general reader will perhaps find 
little of interest. The Indians were reported as gentle 
and tractable, easily won by the friendship of the white 
man, and keeping an unbroken faith while the pledge 
was honored by the Christian. The early settlers of 
Maryland were unchanging in their gentle treatment of 
the Indians, those untutored children of nature, who 
awaited the guidance of teachers " more wise in their 
day and generation." From the records left to us it is 
evident that these teachers endeavored by all mild and 
lawful means to elevate the hearts of the Indians to a 
knowledge of the true God. The Indian of the present 
day, dwelling on the border-lands of civilization, deems 
the white man a traitor to his word, an enemy to the 
Indian race, and a breaker of compacts, whose perfidy, 
must be retaliated upon the innocent by fire and toma- 
haivks. This is rather a sad commentary upon the 
Savage, or the Christian, of our times Which is it ? 

From the "Annals of Annapolis," by Daniel Ridgely, 



16 AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 

of Maryland, is the following : " For several years pre- 
vious to 1675, the inhabitants of the province of Mary- 
land, and the Indians within and upon her border 
county, lived upon terms of peace and amity. Indeed, 
it could not well be otherwise, such being the nature 
and benevolent character of the laws and resolutions of 
the province for the protection of the friendly Indians. 
From the proceedings of the assembly, the strongest 
disposition was manifested to cherish and protect them ; 
and. in no instance did the government take from the abo- 
rigines one acre of land without a remuneration perfectly 
satisfactory to them. 

John G. Morris, Esquire, in his pamphlet entitled 
" The Lords Baltimore," says : " In his views of es- 
tablishing foreign plantations, he thought that the 
original inhabitants, instead of being exterminated, 
should be civilized and converted ; that the Governors 
should not be interested merchants, but gentlemen not 
concerned in trade, and that every one should be left to 
provide for himself by his own industry, without de- 
pendence on a common interest." 

Although Cecilius was the first Proprietary Governor 
who ruled over Maryland, the colony was indebted to 
George Calvert for its polity. 

Hughes, in his "Brief Sketch of Maryland," has 
quoted the following: 

" The mild, liberal, and moral spirit of the father was 
characteristically impressed upon the charter thus 
granted to the son, which strongly corroborates the 
opinion that he himself was its author. Although, very 
naturally, imbued to a considerable extent with the 
aristocratic and loyal spirit of an English subject, still 
he made ample provision for the rights and liberties of 
the colonists. Although, too, he had felt the sting of 
religious intolerance, and had been numbered amongst 



AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 



IT 



the * Proscribed ' on his conversion to the faith of the 
Catholic religion, still he insured to all Christian men 
the most perfect exercise of the rights of conscience. 
Nor was it a mere parchment guarantee. Never, from 
the first settlement of Maryland, down to the period 
when her Proprietary was suspended, could she blush 
for the commission of one act of authorized intolerance 
against any denomination of Christians. To be sure 
Christianity was made the law of the land ; and was, in 
some measure, the boundary line of political franchise. 
The unhappy child of the Synagogue was still doomed 
to bear the mark of an outcast, and was unjustly de- 
barred the privileges of a freeman. * Even so, Calvert 
and his colonists made giant strides in advance of the 
age. Maryland established the principle, and, above 
all, the practice of Christian toleration in the new 
hemisphere, and laid the ground-work for the complete 
superstructure, which was afterward reared by the 
hands of Jefferson and his illustrious co-laborers in the 
cause of truth. She was the first to give ' religious 
liberty a home, its only home in the wide world,' where 
' the disfranchised friends of prelacy from Massachu- 
setts, and the Puritans from Virginia, were welcome to 
equal liberty of conscience and political rights.'' Such 
is a sample only of the honorable and impartial testi- 
mony of Bancroft, who is more than sustained by the 
eloquent historian of Maryland. I say it not in triumph. 
It is a recorded truth. Indeed, the contrast is too 
mournful for triumph. It was truly most lamentable 
to see men who had fled from the old world to secure a 
peaceful enjoyment of civil and religious freedom, them- 
selves, and their children after them, persecuting their 
fellow-men for a difference in creed. Maryland did not, 

* Bancroft's History, U. S., Vol. I, p. 247. 



18 AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 

and could not rejoice in the contrast. She only en- 
deavored to teach a better lesson and to exemplify her 
teaching by her practice." 

The best and most forcible pens of the day have been 
employed in giving honor to George Calvert, who " de- 
serves to be ranked among the most wise and benevolent 
lawgivers of all ages." * And from his name, which 
was kept bright by just deeds, falls the lustre illuminat- 
ing the record of the Lords Baltimore who followed. 

The wise rule of the Proprietary Government diffus- 
ing the happiness of peace throughout the Colony of 
Maryland is due to him ; to his great example also is 
due much of the justice of Cecil ins, the moderation 
and endurance of Leonard, and all that was most ad- 
mirable in the rule of the Proprietary Domain until its 
overthrow, and from its resumption till the Revolution. 
The Honorable Charles Browning, grandson of Charles 
VI, Lord Baltimore, gives a few items in his records 
of the Baltimore family, and in reference to the emi- 
grants " between two and three hundred gentlemen, 
their wives, families and attendants." 

On page 87, among the " Brief Explanations," we 
are told that " Cecilius Lord Baltimore was particularly 
attentive in the selection of those whom he first engaged 
with, and who came over with his brother, that they 
should be sober, virtuous men, his lordship not looking 
so much for present profit as reasonable expectation." 

Prom these men, and in appreciation of Lord Balti- 
more's generosity, the following vote was offered and 
confirmed, and placed among the perpetual laws of the 
State of Maryland in the year 1671 : 

" Great and manifold are the benefits wherewith Al- 
mighty God hath blessed the colony, first brought and 

* Bancroft. 



AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, 



19 



planted within this province of Maryland at your Lord- 
ship's charge, and continued by your care and industry 
in the happy restitution of a blessed peace unto us, 
being lately wasted with a miserable dissension and an 
unhappy war. But more inestimable are the blessings 
thereby poured on this province in planting Christianity 
among a people that knew not God, nor had heard of 
Christ,-" 

" No ceremony that to great oues belongs, 
Not the King's crown, nor the deputed sword, 
The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe, 
Become them with one-half so good a grace 
As mercy does." 




DANIEL DULANY. 



Where are the heroes of the ages past? 

Where the brave chieftains, where the mighty ones 

Who flourished in the infancy of days ? 

All to the grave gone down." — Kikke White. 




OHN V. L. McMAHON, the distinguished 
lawyer and historian, says in a note to his 
Maryland history: "If lessons upon the 
vanity of human hopes would avail, here is 
an individual over whose history we might pause to 
learn how insufficient are all the brightest qualities of 
the mind to rescue the memory of their possessor from 
the common doom of mortality. But half a century 
has gone by, and the very name of Daniel Dulany is 
almost forgotten in his native State, where the unques- 
tioned supremacy of his talents was once the theme of 
every tongue, and the boast of every citizen. 

"In the colonial history of Maryland, the name of 
Dulany is associated with virtue and ability of the 
highest order. Daniel Dulany the elder, the father of 
the distinguished person alluded to in the text, was as 
conspicuous amongst his contemporaries as bis more 
accomplished son, and enjoyed a reputation in the 
province, Burpassed only by that of the latter. Of his 
origin and early history I have been unable to collect 



DANIEL DULANY. 21 

any accurate information. He was admitted to the bar 
of the Provincial Court in 1710, and from that period 
his career was one of uninterrupted honor and useful- 
ness. For nearly forty years he held the first place in 
the confidence of the proprietary, and the affections of 
the people. During that period he filled the various 
offices of Attorney General, Judge of the Admiralty, 
Commissary General, Agent and Receiver General, and 
Counciller, the latter of which he held under the suc- 
cessive administration of Governors Bladen, Ogle, and 
Sharpe. He was also, for several years, a member of 
the Lower House, in which capacity he was distin- 
guished as the leader of the country party, in the con- 
troversy about the extension of the English Statutes. 

" His son Daniel, the greater (if we may use such a 
term), is said to have been educated in England, and 
was admitted to the bar of the Provincial Court in 
1747. In 1757, he was appointed one of the Council, 
and in 1761, the Secretary of the Province, which 
offices he held in conjunction from the latter period 
until the American Revolution. For many years be- 
fore the fall of the proprietary government, he stood 
confessedly without a rival in this colony as a lawyer, 
a scholar, and an orator, and we may safely hazard the 
assertion that in high and varied accomplishments 
which constitute these, he has had amongst the sons 
of Maryland but one equal, and no superior. We may 
admit that tradition is a magnifier, and that men seen 
through its medium and the obscurity of half a century, 
like objects in a misty morning, loom largely in the 
distance; yet with regard to Mr. Dulany, there is no 
room for such illusion. " You may tell Hercules by his 
foot" says the proverb, and this truth is as just, when 
applied to the proportions of the mind as to those of 
the body. The legal arguments and opinions of Mr. 
2 



22 DANIEL DULANY. 

Dulany, which yet remain to us, bear the impress of 
abilities too commanding, and of learning too profound 
to admit of question. Had we but these fragments, 
like the remains of splendor which linger around some 
of the ruins of antiquity, they would be enough for 
admiration; yet they fall very far short of furnishing 
just conceptions of the character and accomplishments 
of his mind. We have higher attestations of these in 
the testimony of contemperaries. For many years be- 
fore the Eevolution he was regarded as an oracle of the 
law. It was the constant practice of the courts of the 
Province to submit to his opinion every question of dif- 
ficulty which came before them, and so infallible were 
his opinions considered, that he who hoped to reverse 
them was regarded " as hoping against hope." Nor was 
his professional reputation limited to the colony. I 
have been credibly informed that he was occasionally 
consulted from England upon questions of magnitude ; 
and that in the Southern counties of Virginia, adjacent 
to Maryland, it was not unfrequent to withdraw ques- 
tions from their courts, and even from the Chancellor 
of England, to submit them to his award. Thus un- 
rivaled in professional learning, according to the rep- 
resentations of his contemporaries, he added to it all 
the power of the orator, the accomplishments of the' 
scholar, the graces of the person, and the serenity of 
the gentleman. Mr. Pinkney, himself the wonder of 
his age, who saw but the setting splendor of Mr. 
Dulany's talents, is reported to have said of him, "that 
even amongst such men as Fox, Pitt, and Sheridan, he 
had not found his superior." 

The above was written in 1830 by Mr. McMahon, yet 
in 1876 much of a historical nature hitherto obscured by 
the dust of time, has been rescued for the benefit of 
future generations. 



DAMEL DULANY. 23 

As age comes upon us we fondly recall the friends 
and associates of childhood ; so our Nation in its hun- 
dreth year reverts with tender and noble pride to the 
bright days of its infancy, to those who gave lustre to 
its name, to those who raised the wide -spreading banner 
above the bulwark of Liberty. 

Maryland in her sublime dignity has ever revered 
the brave, the strong and the good amongst her chil- 
dren. To none of all her great ones is more respect 
due than to Daniel Dulany. The distinguished Phila- 
delphia lawyer, Horace Binney, says in " The Leaders 
of the Old Bar of Philadelphia,"—" Mr. Tilghman was 
also an advocate of great powers, a master of every 
question in his causes, a wary tactician in the manage- 
ment of them, highly accomplished in language, a 
faultless logician, a man of the purest integrity and of 
the highest honor, fluent without the least volubility, 
concise to a degree that left every one's patience and 
attention unimpaired, and perspicuous to almost the 
lowest order of understanding, while he was dealing 
with almost the highest topics. How could such quali- 
ties as these fail to give him a ready acceptance with 
both courts and juries, and to make him the bulwark 
of any cause which his judgment approved ? An in- 
vincible. aversion to authorship and to public office has 
prevented this great lawyer from being known as he 
ought to have been, beyond the limits of his own 
country. He has probably left nothing professional 
behind him but his opinions upon cases, now in vari- 
ous hands, and difficult to collect; but which if col- 
lected and published would place him upon the same 
elevation with Dulany of Maryland." Having recited 
the numerous virtues, talents, and qualifications of 
Chief Justice Tilghman, a Marylander by birth, he 
concludes the recital by comparing him to Daniel 



24 DANIEL DULANV. 

Dal any, which in the opinion of Mr. Binney seems the 
most exalted praise that he could bestow upon a great 
man. 

Mr. Tyler, in his Memoir of Chief Justice Taney, in 
speaking of an important case in the Court of Appeals 
of Maryland, argued by Taney and Harper on the one 
side, and Pinkney and Winder and Williams on the 
other, says : " It is worthy of note, that among the 
authorities cited by Messrs. Harper and Taney, in their 
brief, is the opinion of Daniel Dulany." The opinions 
of this great Maryland lawyer had almost as much 
weight in courts in Maryland, and hardly less with the 
crown lawyers of England, than the opinions of the 
great Roman jurists, that were made authority by the 
edict of the Emperor, had in Roman Courts. This 
was due, in some degree, to the fact that there were no 
reports of Maryland decisions until 1809 : 1 Harris & 
McHenry. In that volume the opinions of Daniel 
Dulany are published along with the decisions of the 
Provincial Court and the Court of Appeals. The high 
reputation of this great Maryland lawyer stimulated 
the ambition of the Maryland bar, while his opinions 
were models of legal discussion for their imitation." 

With the full force of a newly-awakened pride, strong 
efforts are being made to recover from the common dust 
of destructive time those old and honorable traditions 
of the past that are the crownings of our glory. As if 
by threads, or piece by piece, an almost forgotten story 
is brought to view. The chief heroes of this story, 
heroes that had wellnigh become as myths, are Daniel 
Dulany and Daniel Dulany " of Dan." These two men 
stand at the head of the Bar of America. This opinion 
is but the reiteration of an opinion expressed by the 
great lawyers of our land. At the time of the elder 
Dulany's birth the population of Maryland was not 



DANIEL DULANY. 25 

thirty thousand. When the younger Daniel appeared 
among the " children of men " the number of souls in 
the colony of Maryland did not count fifty thousand, 
nor was there a town in the colony of two thousand 
inhabitants. The Dulanys were thorough English law- 
yers, with the most profound legal learning of West- 
minster Hall, The younger lawyer of the two has 
perhaps never been excelled in the accomplishments of 
the forum, and it has been asserted that not previous to 
his time, nor since its close, has his superior appeared 
before the Bar of Westminister. 

Such were the founders of the strength and fame of 
the Maryland Bar. To the glorious height of the 
younger Dulany the youthful aspirants of the Pro- 
vincial Court strove to rise ; yet as children that 
stretch their hands toward the stars in the mighty 
space above them, the hopes of the many were never 
realized. Only two ever approached him in success- 
ful greatness, and these were Luther Martin and 
William Pinkney. The last-named, and the greater 
intellect of the two, is said to have stood in the very 
place of the younger Dulany in the point of effective 
eloquence ; indeed it is a disputed question with the 
majority whether William Pinkney is not entitled to an 
equal amount of praise, and to as high a place on the 
Roll of Honor as the Star Lawyer of older renown. 

As those men who dwell in the region of mountains 
are ever given to looking upward, so are elevated the 
thoughts and desires of those who have constantly 
around them the great in mind and deeds : To the 
Government of the United States of America, the Bar 
of Maryland has given five such Attorney- Generals as 
William Pinkney, William Wirt, Roger Brooke Taney, 
John Nelson, and Reverdy Johnson ; to the Bench of 
the Supreme Court of the United States a Taney and a 



26 1>ANIEL DULANY. 

Chase. Thus from the staunch foundation-stone ros 
this most "mighty tower, the Bar of Maryland ! Wit] 
the progress of society, and the development of nations, 
the power of intellectual superiority must be recognized. 
Intelligence is the mediator, the agent that effects the 
great designs of a divine Providence. In the patri- 
archal days the leaders of the people were chosen as 
well for the ruling qualities of mind as for their moral 
attributes : The open way still winds forever onward 
and upward ! 

In the struggle for intellectual supremacy in the 
contest of argument between the adherent subjects of 
the mother country and the Colonies, Daniel Dulany 
stood pre-eminent. McMahon thus writes of " Daniel 
Dulany, the fit advocate of such a cause: " 

" Conspicuous amongst all the essays of that day in 
opposition to the Stamp Act, is one to the honor of 
which Maryland lays claim, as the production of her 
most distinguished son. It came from the pen of one 
whose very name was a tower of strength. Abilities 
that defied competition, learning that ranged with an 
eagle-flight Over every science, accomplishments that 
fascinated, and gentleness that soothed even envy, all 
conspired to render Daniel Dulany the fit advocate of 
such a cause. His celebrated essay against the Stamp 
Act, entitled "Consideration on, the propriety of impos- 
ing taxes in the British Colonies, for the purpose of rais- 
ing a revenue by Act of Parliament" was published at 
Annapolis on the 14th of October, 1765. It was not 
an argument calculated merely for the meridian of 
Maryland. This |- rovince had a peculiar charter ex- 
emption, but the claims founded on this did not enter 
into the consideration of the general question, and rest- 
ing upon express grant, they were rather in conflict 
with those in support of which no such grant could be 



DANIEL DULANY. 2*7 

adduced. Mr. Dulany had a higher aim. His purpose 
was to show that under the principles of the British 
Constitution, and by force of their condition as British 
subjects, the colonists generally were exempt from the 
tax imposed ; and he has accomplished this by a mode 
of argument the most irresistible.'' He concludes his 
legal argument in these words : " This right of exemp- 
tion from all taxes, without their consent, the colonists 
olaim as British subjects. They derive this right from 
the common law, which their charters have declared 
and confirmed ; and they conceive that when stripped 
of this right, whether by prorogation or by any other 
power, they are, at the same time, deprived of every 
privilege distinguishing free men from slaves." 

Not alone to the mere legal question involved in the 
famous Stamp Act did Mr. Dulany confine his views, 
but with the outlook ing glance of the statesman, he 
suggests a remedy against English oppression. He ad- 
vises the colonies to manufacture for themselves, rather 
than to depend for the mere necessaries of life upon the 
mother country : 

"In this very considerable branch, so little difficulty 
is there, that a beginning is half the work. The path 
is beaten, there is no danger of losing the way, there 
are directors to guide every step. But why should they 
stop at the point of clothing laborers ; why not proceed 
when vigor and strength will increase with the progres- 
sion to clothe the planters ? When the first stage is 
arrived at, the spirits will be recruited, and the second 
should be undertaken with alacrity, since it may be 
performed with ease. In this, too, the experiment hath 
been made, and hath succeeded. Let the manufactures 
of America be the symbol of dignity, the badge of 
virtue, and it will soon break the fetters of distress. A 
garment of linsey-woolsey, When made the distinc- 



28 DANIEL DULANY. 

tion of real patriotism, is more honorable and attractive 
of respect and veneration than all the pageantry, and 
the robes, and the plumes, and the diadem of any em- 
peror without it. Let the emulation be not in the 
richness and variety of foreign productions ; but in the 
improvement and perfection of our own. Let it be de- 
monstrated that the subjects of the British Empire in 
Europe and America are the same, that the hardships 
of the latter will ever recoil upon the former. In 
theory it is supposed that each is equally important to 
the other, that all partake of the adversity and depres- 
sion, if any. The theory is just, and time will certainly 
establish it; but if another principle should be ever 
hereafter adopted in practice, and a violation deliberate, 
cruel, ungrateful, and attended with every instance of 
provocation, be offered to our fundamental rights, why 
should we leave it to the slow advances of time (which 
may be the great hope and reliance, probably, of the 
authors of the injury, whose view it may be to accom- 
plish their selfish purposes in the interval) to prove 
what might be demonstrated immediately ? Instead of 
moping, and puling, and whining to excite compassion, 
in such situations, we ought, with spirit, and vigor, and 
alacrity, to bid defiance to tyranny, by exposing its 
impotence, by making it as contemptible as it would be 
detestable. By a vigorous application to manufactures, 
the consequence of oppression in the Colonies to the in- 
habitants of Great Britain would strike home, and im- 
mediately. None would mistake it. Craft and subtilty 
would not be able to impose upon the most ignorant 
and credulous; for if any should be so weak of sight 
as not to see, they would be so callous as not to feel it 
Such conduct would be the most dutiful and beneficial 
to the mother country. It would point out the dis- 
temper when the remedy might be easy, and a cure at 
once effected by a simple alteration of regimen." 



DANIEL DULANY. 29 

The foregoing extract gives evidence of the wise view 
taken by Mr. Dulany of a great political question. He 
is acknowledged as the father of that policy of the 
Federal Government which a half a century later em- 
braced the principle of the genuine American System. 

Dulany's advice, though bold and fearless as his 
view was broad, was only intended to be of the most 
pacific nature. The proposition for the erection of 
a separate and independent government, would have 
startled the bravest. Neither the minds of the people, 
nor the resources of the Colonies, were at that time 
prepared for a war with the home-land. Eight was the 
chosen text when Dulany's Essay was written ; and Eight 
alone was the inspiration of every loyal heart that looked 
forward to ai* ultimate reconciliation with England. 

Yet an open and forcible resistance was soon con- 
templated to the Stamp Act by the province of Mary- 
land. It was now determined to put an end to its 
operation in the transaction of public business. With 
this purpose, on the 24th of February, 1766, a large 
number of the principal inhabitants of Baltimore 
county assembled at Baltimore town, and organized as 
an association for the maintenance of order and the 
protection of American liberty, under the name of the 
Sons of Liberty. They entered into a resolution to 
meet at Annapolis on the first of March ensuing, for 
the purpose of compelling the officers there to open 
their offices and to transact business without stamped 
paper. This design was immediately communicated to 
the inhabitants of the neighboring counties, who were 
invited to co operate in it by the formation of similar 
associations. The officers, at whom their resolutions 
were aimed, were notified of their coming, and advised 
to be ready to receive them. On the first of March the 
association met at Annapolis. They sent a written 



30 



DANIEL DULANY. 



communication of their purpose to the Chief Justice of 
the Provincial Court, the Secretary, the Commissary 
General and the Judges of the Land Office. The 
answers returned were not satisfactory. After issuing 
invitations to the other counties to form similar associ- 
ations, the assembly adjourned to meet again at Annapo- 
lis to ascertain what the officers intended to do in re- 
gard to their application, at their previous meeting. 
On the day appointed the association repaired to the 
Provincial Court to present and enforce their petition. 
The Court at first refused to comply, but finally passed 
an order in conformity to the petition, and the other 
officers immediately acceded. Thus the Stamp Act 
was nullified in Maryland. 

" Mr. Dulany, during this period, was (says McMahon) 
the Secretary of the Province, and when the association 
of the Sons of Liberty was formed, he, and the other 
officers of the province, were notified of their intention 
to come to Annapolis and compel the officers to trans- 
act business without the use of stamped paper. Thus 
notified, he submitted himself to the advice of the 
Governor and Council, apprising them at the same 
time that in acceding to this measure he would act 
against his own sentiments, and would not hesitate to 
lay down his office to avoid such an issue, were it not 
that by so doing, he would cast upon the Governor the 
necessity of making a new appointment requiring the 
use of stamped paper, and with it a responsibility 
which might bring even the person of the latter into 
jeopardy. 'He (says Mr. Dulany in his letter to the 
executive) seems to have as little power to protect him- 
self as I have; but if that respect should be openly and 
violently trampled upon, and personal indignities be 
offered, the example and the consequences would be 
much worse in his case than in that of a subordinate 



DANIEL DULANY. 



31 



officer constrained to yield to the times.' The Council 
seems to have put this application under ' an advisave,' 
and in the meantime the Sons of Liberty came and 
placed Mr. Dulany, as well as the others, in the con- 
dition of 'officers constrained to yield to the times. 9 
Thus to have thrown himself into the breach for the 
protection of the Governor, and at the hazard of all the 
reputation he had acquired, evinced a magnanimity 
which even his enemies must admire. The honors 
lavished upon Mr. Dulany by the repeal of the Stamp 
Act abundantly demonstrate that his . course on this 
occasion had in no degree diminished the respect and 
affection of the colony, and furnish the strongest pos- 
sible attestation to the purity of his .motives and the 
consistency of his course." Mr. Dulany possessed the 
highest element of heroic character — moral courage — 
without which no man can be a statesman, telling the 
people what is the best for their country and not what 
pleases them. This generation, so full of pusillanimity, 
should study the life of this great leader of a great 
generation* in the most trying period of American 
history. He did more than any man of the time -to 
expose the usurped power of England either by pre- 
rogative or legislation, to tax the colonies for revenue. 
" He became (says McMahon), the Pitt of Maryland, 
and whilst his fellow citizens hailed him with one 
voice as the great champion of their liberties, even 
foreign colonies, in their joyous celebrations of the 
repeal of the Stamp Act, did not hesitate to place him 
in their remembrances with a Camden and a Chatham." 
To the last hour of discussion, Daniel Dulany op- 
posed by the strong expression of his opinion the 
separation of the colonies from England. He doubted 
the wisdom of so bold an endeavor at that time. Right, 
to be available to the workers of it, must sometimes 



32 DANIEL DULANY. 

await a propitious season. He feared for this seeming 
bantling that dared raise its voice against the veteran 
army and "wooden walls" of Britannia. Reason, and 
not force, was the weapon that he urged. 

The result is known. When the royal authority was 
overthrown, Daniel Dulany, junior, who had long held 
the high office of First Secretary of the Province, 
retired into the quietude of private life. The exten- 
sive property possessed by the family was confiscated 
to the use of the new government. A portion of the 
estates situated in Frederick county, and known as 
Prospect Hall, is now in the possession of a family 
alien in race and name to the original distinguished 
owner. In Baltimore county, a tract of land known as 
Dulany's Valley, extends for a distance of about five 
miles. It is watered by small streams, and is noted for 
its fertility and rich natural beauties. 

A writer in one of the Baltimore county papers 
recently contributed the following information : "Just 
above you is a beautiful valley, which you and every- 
body, including the postoffice authorities, always write 
* Dulaney's Valley.' The name is derived from a 
member of the Dulany family, who, at the time of the 
Revolution, owned some 5,000 acres in a body, cover- 
ing what is now known as Dulany's Valley, with some 
of the surrounding hills. Dulany being a loyalist or 
tory, this property was confiscated and sold by the 
State. Five hundred acres apiece were, however, 
granted by the State to each of his three sisters — 
Mrs. Hanson, Mrs. Fitzhugh and Mrs. Belt, compris- 
ing the beautiful farms owned at present by Messrs. 
Peerce, Matthews, Payne and others. The official 
name of the Dulany tract, if I remember rightly, was 
the ' Valley of Jehosaphat.' " 

In this valley, and embraced in the estate, is the 



DANIEL DULANY. 



33 



homestead of a branch of the Fitzhngh line, known as 
" Old Windsor Hill." In the graveyard, on the brow 
of this hill, lie the remains of Mrs. Walter Dulany, 
who was first the wife, and afterward the beautiful 
widow of Lloyd Dulany, killed in a duel with the 
Eeverend Bennet Allen. 

Many valuable mementoes belonging originally to 
this family, and now scattered here and there, attest to 
the high social standing of the Dulanys in this country 
and in England. 

The relation of a romance in which the Dulanys 
have a leading part will not here be inappropriate. 

Before the breaking out of the Eevolution, the Epis- 
copal benefice, including Annapolis, was held by Mr. 
Bennet Allen, a clergyman of the established church. 
The revenue of this parish not being so great as that of 
some others in the colony, Mr. Allen sought to add 
another living to his charge. The Frederick parish 
is said to have been the object of his aim. A plurality of 
livings being contrary to the laws, much opposition to 
the reverend gentleman's wishes was evinced. Amongst 
those who thus opposed him was Walter Dulany, the 
son of the elder Daniel. The matter under discussion 
found its way into Green's Gazette, and what had be- 
gun in words ended in blows. Young Lloyd Dulany, 
the half-brother of Walter, being incensed by a publi- 
cation of Mr. Allen's, horse-whipped the clergyman in 
the streets of Annapolis. The war breaking out im- 
mediately, Mr. Allen left for England. Mr. Dulany, 
by his haughty demeanor toward the American pa- 
triots, rendered himself obnoxious. His house on Main 
street (now occupied as a hotel) was several times sur- 
rounded by the indignant " freemen " of the day. Al- 
though no violence had yet been done, the threats of 
the people induced his departure. Accompanied by his 



34 TANIEL DULANY. 

youthful and beautiful wife, be sailed for London. 
After establishing himself in London, the quarrel be- 
tween Lloyd Dulany and Mr. Allen was renewed. 

The reputations and social standing of several noted 
Americans being attacked, in the public prints, imme- 
diately following an article against Governor Thomas 
Johnson of Maryland, was one relating to the Dulany 
family. The accompanying anonymous contribution 
was published in 1782 : 

" Daniel Dulany, Secretary of Maryland, a person of 
still lower extraction than the former, offered the service 
of his pen to the Congress, which, as he would not act 
ostensibly, was rejected, and his name struck out of the 
list of toasts proposed at an entertainment made during 
the meeting of the first Congress, upon a motion of the 
Maryland delegates, as inimical to the cause of liberty. 
This, and other instances of disaffection to the 
family, determined them to divide, part coming over 
to England under the character of sufferers to the royal 
cause, and part residing in America to take care of their 
property, and to be ready to close with the winning side. 
Policy too common on this occasion, as it only serves to 
prolong the war, and becomes a heavy burthen on this 
country : there being several of this name and family 
who Have allowances from Government." 

This was duly responded to by Lloyd Dulany, Esq., 
the brother of the absent man upon whom the attack 
had been made. The response was severe and just. 
Considerable time elapsed before the writer of the 
anonymous libel was made known. Finally the fol- 
lowing reply appeared in print from the pen of the 
clergyman whose name is appended to the letter: 

" Sin : — It is not till the present moment that I find myself at 
liberty to avow that the character of Daniel Dulany, Secretary 
of Maryland, published sometime since in the Morning Post, was 



DANIEL DULANY. 35 

written by me; the author of which you call an infamous liar 
and a cowardly assassin; though I know you to be, from facts, 
what I am only in your imagination, both an infamous liar, and 
a cowardly assassin. I shall not go about to recriminate, because 
I do not wish to imitate, but to punish your insolence. If you 
harbor still the same degree of resentment, the b< ar< r will put 
you in a way of carrying it into immediate execution. 

BENNEi ALLEN." 
" Mr. Lloyd Dtjlany." 

This invitation was accepted. A duel was fought 
and Lloyd Dulany was mortally wounded. Mr. Bennet 
Allen was tried and found guilty of "manslaughter 
only." He was fined one shilling and condemned to 
six months' imprisonment at Newgate. 

It will thus be seen that in those days as in these 
latter times, the public journals, which should be the 
instruments of peace and the distrihutors of truth to the 
people, were made the receptacles of petty spites and 
malignant hatreds. Many of our journals may there- 
fore lay claims to an old established precedent in a 
right to slander. 

From two gentlemen, one the lineal descendant of 
Daniel Dulany the elder, the other coming from 
Daniel the younger, the following authentic informa- 
tion is obtained. That culled from the leaves of a 
"family history," is quoted first: "The Dulamjs of 
Maryland, were the Delaneys in Ireland, whence their 
ancestor came. He was in some way related to the 
well-known Dr. Patrick Delaney, the friend of Swift, 
whose name often appears in contemporary literature. 
The story is, that young Delaney ran away from his 
friends without money and ' indentured himself/ as it 
was called, for passage money — in plain English he 
agreed to be sold into servitude for a time on his 
arrival on this side to pay his way. His time was 
bought by a gentleman, a lawyer, in one of the lower 



36 DANIEL DULANY. 

counties and he went into service at his master's resi- 
dence. It was proved, however, that he was seen read- 
ing Latin by the fire-light in the servants' quarter, 
which fact led to an investigation, when it was dis- 
covered that he was master of what was considered a 
fine education in those days. His studiousness and 
erudition so wrought on his master, that he took him 
into his office, and after making him a lawyer, bestowed 
upon him his daughter in marriage." So runs the 
family story ; and it was thus that Daniel Dulany, the 
Irish servant, became the great barrister, and the. pro- 
genitor of one of the most aristocratic families of the 
Colony of Maryland. 

This romantic story from the pen of an honorable 
representative of the " great barrister," gives a twofold 
interest to the hero, who in a false position, and under 
difficulties, still preserved his noble ambition. In 
the account given by the second gentleman referred to, 
as the descendent of the younger Daniel, the youthful 
emigrant's departure from home without "a leave of 
absence" is partly explained: The elder Daniel Dulany 
was born in Queen's county, Ireland. He was cousin- 
germanto Patrick Delaney, mentioned frequently in con- 
nection with Dean Swift. The old remembered couplet 
of Swift's is familiar to many a reader, 
" Delaney sends a silver stand ish 
When I no more a pen can brandish. 

Patrick was born in Ireland in 1686, and died in 1768. 
He was a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, where he 
was educated. He afterward became Chancellor of 
Christ Church, and Prebendary of Saint Patrick's, in 
Dublin. He was Dean of Down in 1744. He was a 
man of great learning, as well as an author of note. 
He wrote some strictures upon Lord Orrery regarding 
his " Remarks on the Life and Writings of Swift." 



DANIEL DULANY. 



37 



The name of Dnlany, like many others, and especially 
those of Ireland, has undergone the changes of time 
and circumstance. After the Siege of Athlone, where 
the Prince of Orange was defeated, in 1690, a portion 
of the Delaney family left Ireland and settled in 
London. Two of the name, said to be cousins, were 
engaged in this battle, one a Colonel Delany, the other 
a Captain Dwllany. 

The arms of this family are registered about the 
period above-named at London. The crest is an up- 
lifted arm and dagger. The arms a lion rampant in 
quartered shield. 

One of this family, in 1178, was Felix O'Dullany, 
(Roman Catholic) Bishop of Ossory, in Ireland. 

The Dulanys of Maryland were Protestants, however, 
having left the ancient faith. From the same great 
clan in the Kings and Queens' counties came the 
O'Delans and the Delanos ; of the same race also is 
the present distinguished editor of the London Times, 
Mr. Delane. O'Hart thus refers to the name: — 
" O'Dubhlaine, or Delaney, Chiefs of Tuath-an- 
Toraidh : and a clan of note in the barony of Upper 
Ossory, Queens County, and also in Kilkenny." 

Daniel Dulany was entered at the University of 
Dublin; but in consequence of his father having 
married a second time, he left the college without 
taking his degree. 

In 1710 he was admitted to the Bar of Maryland. 

His first wife was a daughter of Colonel Carter, of 
Calvert county, Maryland,— by her he had no children. 
His second wife was Rebecca, daughter of Colonel 
Walter Smith, of Calvert county. His third wife was 
the sister of Governor Edward Lloyd, of Maryland. 

He died at Annapolis, December the 5th, 1750, in 
the sixty-eighth year of his age. He was honorably 



38 DANIEL DULANY. 

interred in the vault near the north entrance of Saint 
Anne's Church at Annapolis. His pall was supported 
by his Excellency, the Governor of Maryland, four of 
the Honorable Council and the Worshipful Mayor of 
Annapolis. 

Daniel Dulany " the greater " was the son of Daniel 
Dulany the first, by the second marriage. He was edu- 
cated at Eton, and at Clare Hall, Cambridge, England. 
He was afterward of the Temple. He was admitted 
to the Bar of Maryland in the year 1740. His wife 
was Miss Tasker, the sister of Col. Benjamin Tasker, 
Jr. He died in the city of Baltimore, March the 19th, 
1797, aged 75 years and 8 months. 

In Saint Paul's church, Baltimore, there is a monu- 
ment erected to his memory. His mortal remains are 
supposed to be interred elsewhere, however, as upon 
the stone there is no hie jacet. A statue of this great 
man once stood in the Episcopal Church of Saint Anne, 
at Annapolis. An accidental fire destroyed this venera- 
ble building in 1856, and the statue was reduced to . 
lime. This church was named in commemoration of 
Queen Anne, of England. In the lofty steeple of the 
church hung a deep-toned bell, presented by that royal 
lady. At the time of the destructive fire mentioned, 
the bell which was made to sway to and fro by the up- 
ward rush of the heated air, rang out a solemn and 
dirge-like strain, recalling by turns to the minds of the 
assembled multitude the peals that had rung through 
long generations of ye olden time, for the Coming and 
the Going which we know as Life and Death ; finally it 
descended with a mighty crash into the leaping flames 
that illumined the darkness of the night, ringing 
thenceforth only in memory through the silence, the 
dust, and the ashes, of the unreturning Past. 



THE RAVEN. 



By Edgar Alla^ Poe. 

OP BALTIMOltE, MD. 




NCE upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak 

and weary, 
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten 

lore ; 

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there 
came a tapping, 
As of some one gently rapping — rapping at my chamber door. 
*" Tis some visitor," I muttered, tapping at my chamber door ; 
14 Only this, and nothing more." 

Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak December, 
And each separate dying ember wiought its ghost upon the floor. 
Eagerly I wished the morrow ; vainly I had sought to borrow 
From my books surcease of sorrow — sorrow for the lost Lenore, 
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore — 
Nameless here forevermore. 

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain 
Thrilled me — filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before; 
So that now, to c-till the beating of my heart, I stood repeating: 
" 'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door — 
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door ; 
This it is, and nothing more." 



40 EDGAR ALLAN POE. 

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, 
«' Sir," said I, " or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; 
But the fact is, I was napping, and so gently you came rapping, 
And so faintly you came tapping — tapping at my chamber door, 
That I scarce was sure I heard you : " here I opened wide the 
door : — 

Darkness there, and nothing more. 

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, 

fearing, 
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream 

before ; 
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, 
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word 

"Lenore!" 
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word 

" Lenore ! " 

Merely this, and nothing more. 

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning, 
Soon again I heard a tapping something louder than before. 
44 Surely," said I, " surely that is something at my window lattice ; 
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore — 
Let my heart be still a moment, and this mystery explore: 
'Tis the wind, and nothing more." 

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter, 
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore. 
Not the least obeisance made he ; not a minute stopped or stayed 

he ; 
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door, 
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door — 
Perched, and sat, and nothing more. 

Then this ebon bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, 
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore; 
" Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, " art sure 

no craven ; 
Ghastly, grim, and ancient Raven, wandering from the Nightly 

shore ; 
Tell iiie what ihy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian Shore," 
Quoth the Raven, " Nevumoie." 



EDGAR ALLAN POE. 41 

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to bear discourse so plainty, 
Though its answer little meaning, little relevancy bore ; 
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being 
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber-door, 
With such a name as " Nevermore." 

But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only 
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour ; 
Nothing further then he uttered ; not a feather then he fluttered. 
Till I scarcely more thau muttered, " Other friends have flown 

before ; 
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown 

before." 

Then the bird said, " Nevermore." 

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, 
41 Doubtless," said I, " what it utters is its only stock and store, 
Caught from some unhappy master, whom unmerciful disaster 
Followed fast, and followed faster till his songs one burden bore ; 
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore 
Of " Never— nevermore." 

But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling, 
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust 

and door; 
Then upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking 
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore — 
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of 

yore 

Meant in croaking " Nevermore." 

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing 
To the fowl, whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core; 
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining 
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloating o'er ; 
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er, 
S?ie shall press, ah, nevermore ! 

Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen 

censer 
Swung by seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor. 



42 EDGAR ALLAN POE. 

" Wretch," I cried, " thy God hath lent thee— by these angels he 

hath sent thee 
Respite— respite and nepenthe, from thy memories of Lenore! 
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore !" 
Quoth the Raven, " Nevermore." 

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil !— prophet still, if bird or 

devil ! — 
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here 

ashore, 
Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted— 
On this Home by Honor haunted— tell me truly, I implore— 
Is there— is there balm in Gilead ?— tell me, tell me, I implore." 
Quoth the Raven, " Nevermore." 

" Prophet !" said I, " thing of evil !— prophet still, if bird or 

devil ! 
By that heaven that bends above us— by that God we both 

adore — 
Tell this soul, with sorrow laden, if within the distant Aidenn, 
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore V ' 
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore." 

11 Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend ! " I shrieked 

upstarting — 
" Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian Shore ! 
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath 

spoken ! 
Leave my loneliness unbroken !— quit the bust above my door 1 
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off 

my door I" 

Quoth the Raven, " Nevermore." 

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting 
On the pallid bust of Pallas, just above my chamber door; 
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, 
And the lamp-light o'er him stealing throws his shadow on the 

floor ; 
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the 

floor 

Shall be lifted — nevermore ! 



THOMAS JOHNSON, 
The First Governor oe the State of Maryland. 



& 


3 C^S~k 



HE ABBE ROBIN, one of the Chaplains of 
the French Army in North America, thus 
writes of Annapolis as it appeared during the 
progress of the Revolution : u In that very- 
inconsiderable town standing at the mouth of the 
Severn, where it falls into the bay, of the few 
buildings it contains, at least three-fourths may be 
styled elegant and grand. Female luxury here exceeds 
what is known in the provinces of France. A French 
hair-dresser is a man of importance amongst them, and 
it is said a certain dame here hires one of that craft 
at one thousand crowns a year. The State House is a 
very beautiful building ; I think the most so of any I 
have seen in America." From the "gossiping" letter 
of the Abbe, we learn of the customs prevailing in what 
was then known as the Athens of America. McMahon, 
the historian, says of it : " Long before the era of the 
American Revolution it was conspicuous as the seat of 
wealth and fashion ; and the luxurious habits, elegant 
accomplishments, and profuse hospitality of its inhabi- 
tants were proverbially known throughout the Colonies. 
It was the seat of a wealthy government, 
and of its principal institutions, and as such congre- 
gated around it many whose liberal attainments emi- 



44 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

nently qualified them for society, and the endorsements 
of whose offices enabled them to keep pace even with 
the extravagances of fashion." 

The seat of the government of Maryland was trans- 
ferred from Saint Mary's to Annapolis, then called the 
Port of Annapolis, in the winter of 1694-1695. Erected 
into a city, it was invested with the privileges of send- 
ing delegates to the Assembly in 1708. In this favored 
city sat a court of general jurisdiction, in matters of a 
certain grade, over the whole State. This was called 
the Provincial Court, and the Court of Appeals. In 
these two courts all the leading lawyers of the State 
practiced. Here greatness found utterance, and through 
its appealing eloquence the Bar of Maryland developed 
its strength. 

Thomas Johnson was reared in the office of the Pro- 
vincial Court, learning the course of its procedure. He 
studied law in the office of Mr. Bordley, an eminent 
lawyer of the time ; such were the advantages of his 
position. 

Thomas Johnson, having settled at Annapolis, con- 
tinued attaining eminence at the Bar until the approach 
of the American Revolution. 

The Stamp Act had now been passed by the English 
Parliament. The sole power to convene the General 
Assembly of Maryland was vested in the Governor of 
the State. In November, 1763, Governor Sharpe pro- 
rogued it, and by repeated prorogations postponed its 
session. The Assembly was, however, at length con- 
vened on the 23d of September, 1765. 

The Stamp Act was the first subject discussed. To 
this Assembly Thomas Johnson was sent as a delegate 
from Anne Arundel county. 

A circular from the Assembly of Massachusetts in- 
vited the other Colonies to unite with them in the 



TIIOMAS JOHNSON. 45 

appointment of Commissioners to a general Congress to 
be held at New York. 

This was immediately taken up for consideration. 
On the second day of its session, the Assembly passing 
by all other business, concurred in the proposition and 
appointed Commissioners. A committee for drafting the 
instructions of the Commission was also appointed, 
and Thomas Johnson chosen as a member thereof. 

The General Assembly adopted and ordered to be 
published on the 28th of September, 1765, a series of 
resolutions declaring the character and tendencies of 
the late measures of the English Parliment. Of this 
portion of Maryland's history, McMahon says : " Pre- 
eminent amongst all the legislative declarations of the 
Colonies for the lofty and dignified tone of their 
remonstrances, and for the entire unanimity with 
which they were adopted, they form one of the proud- 
est portions of our history." 

The indignant expressions of the several Colonies 
caused the repeal of the offensive Stamp Act by the 
English Parliament, on the 18th day of March, 1766. 
The Colonies were unsatisfied. The claim to the right 
of revenue taxation had not been removed. Against 
this power involved in the Stamp Act the Colonies con- 
tended. Under an assumption of regulating the com- 
merce of the Colonies, said to be justified by the dis- 
tinction originally drawn by the colonists themselves, 
between internal and external taxation, the Parliament 
contemplated a new scheme in 1767. The Act was 
passed on the 2nd of July of that year. The Act was to 
take place after the 20th of November ensuing, by 
which new duties were imposed on tea and other of the 
most necessary articles of consumption. After the pas- 
sage of this and other obnoxious acts, the Assembly of 
Maryland was not convened until May the 24th, 1768. 
4 



46 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

The Massachusetts Assembly of January, 1768, had 
issued a circular to the Colonial Assemblies generally, 
detailing its own operations and inviting concurrence. 

The injunction of the Crown to the Governors of the 
Colonies generally, was to prorogue their Assemblies 
should any inclination be manifested to second the 
designs of the Massachusetts circular. 

The Lower House of the Assembly of Maryland took 
the Massachusetts circular into consideration on the 
8th of June, 1768. 

A committee was appointed, consisting of gentlemen 
distinguished for ability, and devotion to the cause of 
the Colonies. 

This committee was instructed to draft a petition of 
remonstrance to the King of England against the late 
impositions. Thomas Johnson was one of this com- 
mittee. 

McMahon says: "Their petition to the King may 
safely challenge a comparison with any similar paper 
of that period, as an eloquent and affecting appeal to 
the justice of the crown." 

The General Assembly of Maryland controlled by its 
right the officers of the province, and regulated their 
compensation for official services. 

The fees of office had been prescribed by an act 
passed in the year 1763, and which had been unchanged 
until October 1770. In the session of September, 1770, 
the act had been presented for renewal. 

There were no salaries. An officer was allowed a 
separate fee for each definite act of service. 

The fees which were established by this act of 1763 
had prevailed from a very early period in the Colony. 

The excesses practiced under this system prevented 
the statute of 1763 from being re-enacted. Governor 
Eden resolved to regulate the fees under the preroga- 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 47 

tives of his office. On the 26th of November, 1770, 
he issued a proclamation to that effect. No measure 
of internal polity was ever more thoroughly discussed 
or more closely investigated. Parties were formed 
calling to their aid every man of influence or ability. 

Green's Gazette, that common meeting-ground of the 
day, also served as a medium in the discussion. Op- 
posed to the proclamation of the Governor was Thomas 
Johnson, amongst the foremost. 

McMahon, in his history, in treating of this discus- 
sion, says: "The reputation of Thomas Johnson does 
not rest alone upon the memorials of our colonial his- 
tory. It has a prouder record in the history of his 
State, in the councils of the American nation. Dis- 
tinguished as the first Governor of Maryland, after her 
elevation to the rank of an independent State, and as 
one of her ablest representatives in the Continental 
Congress, his efforts in this mere provincial controversy 
are adverted to, not as evidences of his character, but 
as the earnest of those virtues afterward so conspicuous 
in the discharge of his arduous and dangerous duties 
during the darkest hours of the Revolution. At this 
early period he held a professional rank, and enjoyed a 
degree of public respect in his own Colony, sufficient 
for enviable distinction." 

The next Assembly convened, after the proclamation 
of the Governor, was in October, 1771. 

Every effort was made to procure the withdrawal of 
the proclamation in the Lower House during a session 
of something more than two months. The matter 
under controversy had no more eloquent discussor 
than Thomas Johnson. The right of taxation was 
declared to belong to the Assembly alone. The procla- 
mation, as well as the regulation of fees in the land, 
were declared illegal, the measures arbitrary. 



48 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

An address to the Governor, drawing attention to his 
illegal course, followed these resolutions from the Lower 
House. 

The delegate from Anne Arundel County, Thomas 
Johnson, presented the address to the House. 

It was adopted with but three dissenting voices. 

In this manner concludes the appeal : — 

" Permit us to entreat your Excellency to review this 
unconstitutional assumption of power, and consider its 
pernicious consequences. Applications to the public 
offices are not of choice, but necessity. Eedress cannot 
otherwise be had for the smallest or most atrocious 
injuries; and as surely as that necessity does exist, and 
a binding force in the proclamation or regulation of 
fees in the land office be admitted, so certainly must 
the fees thereby established be paid to obtain redress. 
In the sentiments of a much approved and admired 
writer, suppose the fees imposed by this proclamation 
could be paid by the good people of this Province with 
the utmost ease, and that they were the most exactly 
proportioned to the value of the officer's services ; yet, 
even in such a supposed case, this proclamation ought 
to be regarded with abhorrence. For who are a free 
people f Not those over whom government is reason- 
able and equitably exercised; but those who live under 
a government so constitutionally checked and con- 
trolled, that proper provision is made against its being 
otherwise exercised. This act of power is founded on 
the destruction of constitutional security. If the pro- 
clamation may rightfully regulate the fees, it has a 
right to fix any quantum. If it has a right to regulate, 
it has a right to regulate to a million ; for where does 
its right stop ? At any given point ! To attempt to 
limit the right, after granting it to exist at all, is con- 
trary to justice. If it has a right to tax us, then, 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 49 

whether our money shall continue in our own pockets 
depends no longer on us, but on the prerogative." 

Unavailing were these remonstrances. The views of 
the Governor remained unchanged. No compromise 
seemed possible, and the refractory Assembly was pro- 
rogued according to the order of the crown. 

The year 1774 had arrived, and on the 31st day of 
March was passed in Parliament the Boston Port-Bill, 
taking from Boston all its privileges as a port of entry 
and discharge. Aroused by these measures, the Mary- 
land colonists met in General Convention in the city of 
Annapolis on the 22nd of June, 1774, the different 
counties being there represented by their most dis- 
tinguished men. Thomas Johnson appeared as a 
deputy from Anne Arundel county. At the meeting 
of the Convention it was agreed that any divided ques- 
tion should be settled by vote, each county having one 
vote, the majority settling the question. 

By the 10th resolution, it was resolved, " That 
Matthew Tilghman, Thomas Johnson, Robert Golds- 
borough, William Paca, and Samuel Chase, Esquires, 
or any two or more of them, be deputies for this Pro- 
vince, to attend a general Congress of deputies from the 
Colonies, at such time and place as may be agreed on, 
to effect one general plan of conduct, operating on the 
commercial connection of the Colonies with the mother 
country, for the relief of Boston and the preservation of 
American liberty ; and that the deputies of this pro- 
vince immediately correspond with Virginia and Penn- 
sylvania, and through them with the other Colonies, to 
obtain a meeting of the general Congress, and to com- 
municate, as the opinion of this committee, that the 
twentieth day of September next will be the most con- 
venient time for a meeting, which time, to prevent 
delay, they are directed to propose." 



50 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

On the 5th day of September, 1774, assembled the 
Continental Congress, toward which the gaze of all the 
Colonies was directed. 

On the 2nd of October a resolution was passed by 
Congress that an address to the crown should be pre- 
pared. Richard Henry Lee, John Adams, Thomas 
Johnson, and Patrick Henry, were appointed to pre- 
pare the address. 

In the memoirs of Richard Henry Lee, by his grands 
son, published in 1825, he mentions in a note referring 
to this committee Thomas Johnson in the following 
manner : — 

"The author cannot pass the name of this gentle-, 
man without a tribute to his memory, which every 
virtuous American must delight to bestow. He was 
one of the ablest men in the old Congress. There did 
not live in those times which "tried men's souls" a 
purer patriot or a more efficient citizen. He was Gov- 
ernor of Maryland during the darkest period of the 
Revolution. Under his administration, Maryland was 
distinguished for her devotion to the common cause. 
On one occasion when General Washington was retreat- 
ing through the Jerseys, he raised a large body of 
Maryland militia, and marched at their head to his 
camp, by whom he was received with the most marked 
respect. He was under the Federal government a judge 
of the United States Court. He was frequently in 
flattering terms invited by General Washington to ac- 
cept the appointment of Secretary of State. No Roman 
citizen ever loved his country more. His private 
virtues entitle him to veneration and love. Thomas 
Johnson was indeed an honor to the cause of liberty." 

John Adams, afterward President of the United 
States, in his works edited by his grandson, Charles 
Francis Adams, thus speaks of him : " Johnson, of 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 5 I 

Maryland, has a clear and cool head, an extensive 
knowledge of trade as well as of law. He is a deliber- 
ating man, but not a shining orator ; his passion and 
imagination do not appear enough for an orator ; his 
reason and penetration appear, but not his rhetoric." 
He reports Johnson as saying in one of his speeches in 
1775 : " We ought not to lay down a rule in a passion. 
I see less and less prospect of a reconciliation every day, 
but I would not render it impossible. . . . Thirteen 
Colonies connected with Great Britain, in sixteen 
months, have been brought to an armed opposition to 
the claims of Great Britain. The line we have pur- 
sued has been the line we ought to have pursued; if 
what we have done had been done two years ago, four 
Colonies would not have been for it." Again Mr. 
Adams says : " Mr. Johnson, of Maryland, was the 
most frequent speaker from his State, and while he re- 
mained with us, was inclined to Mr. Dickerson for some 
time, but ere long he and all his State came cordially 
into our system. In the fall of 1776, his State ap- 
pointed him General of Militia, and he marched to the 
relief of General Washington in the Jerseys. He 
never returned to Congress." The most important act 
of Mr. Johnson while in Congress was his motion that 
George Washington, of Virginia, be appointed Com- 
mander-in-Chief of the Continental Army. An act, 
which was in itself the first movement toward so 
glorious an event, might justly be regarded as the most 
important of his life. John C. Hamilton, in his life of 
Alexander Hamilton, thus notices the fact : 

" On the fifteenth of June, 1775, Colonel Washington 
was unanimously elected, and the seventeenth, the day 
on which the battle of Bunker Hill was fought, was 
commissioned as Commander-in-Chief." 

The enviable distinction of having nominated him to 



52 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

this place belongs to Thomas Johnson, of Maryland, 
who soon after signalized his patriotism by hastening 
from civil life with a body of Maryland troops to join 
the army during its retreat through New Jersey, and 
who, as a just tribute to his virtues and talents, was 
elected the first Governor of that State. 

As this circumstance is not only one of great public 
interest, but had an important bearing on the political 
destinies of the country, and more especially as it has 
been erroneously supposed that this honor was claimed 
by John Adams, a distinguished member of that Con- 
gress, it becomes important to give the evidence on 
which this statement rests. It is found in the follow- 
ing extract of a letter from that gentleman to Colonel 
Pickering, dated August 6th, 1822. After giving an 
account of his going to Philadelphia in 1775, in com- 
pany with dishing, Samuel Adams, and Paine, " four 
poor pilgrims," Mr. Adams says: "They were met at 
Frankfort by Dr. Push, Mr. Mifflin, Mr. Bayard, and 
others, who desired a conference, and particularly cau- 
tioned not to lisp the word ' Independence.' They 
added, you must not come forward with any bold meas- 
ures; you must not pretend to take the lead; you 
know Virginia is the most populous State in the Union ; 
they are very proud of their ancient dominion, as they 
call it; they think they have the right to lead, and the 
Southern States and Middle States are too much dis- 
posed to yield it to them. This was plain dealing, Mi\ 
Pickering ; and I must confess that there appeared so 
much wisdom and good sense in it, that it made a deep 
impression on my mind, and it had an equal effect on 
all my colleagues. This conversation, and the princi- 
ples and facts and motives suggested in it, have given 
a color, complexion, and character to the whole policy 
of the United States from that day to this. Without 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 53 

if, Mr. Washington would never have commanded our 
armies, nor Mr. Jefferson have been the author of the 
Declaration of Independence, nor Mr. Eichard Henry 
Lee the mover of it, nor Mr. Chase the mover of foreign 
relations. 

" If I have ever had cause to repent of any part of this 
policy, that repentance ever has been and ever will be 
unavailing. I had forgot to say, nor Mr. Johnson ever 
have been the nominator of Washington for General." 

It is worthy of note, that George Washington and 
Thomas Johnson, two great men born in the same year, 
in adjoining States, were united by the firmest bonds of 
a friendship, strengthened by devotion to the same 
cause. It is alike worthy of remark that this chosen 
friend of our Chief is scarcely known by more than 
name to the people for whose honor and glory he strove. 
The words of McMahon in reference to the silence of 
most historians upon the life of Dulany, might be 
quoted with nearly the same degree of justice in regard 
to Governor Johnson. No man did more for the ad- 
vancement of Liberty's cause, yet amongst the recorded 
names of American heroes, how seldom do we find his 
name. Few men of Maryland's struggling days did so 
much toward furnishing material for the history of 
Maryland — yet how has history forgotten him ! ! 

The Maryland Congress was again convened by a call 
of its deputies on the 21st of November, 1774. The 
proceedings of the Congress up to that time were unani- 
mously approved. 

At the December session a committee charged with 
the important duty of corresponding with the other 
Colonies was appointed. 

This was known as the " Provincial Committee of 
Correspondence." 

Thomas Johnson was one of the committee, being 
then a deputy in Congress. 



54 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

On the 14th of October, 1774, the first tea-burning 
in Maryland took place. The tea was brought on the 
brig Peggy Stewart. Mr. Stewart, a part owner in the 
cargo, was forced to set fire with his own hands to the 
vessel. This act was witnessed by Maryland patriots 
who wore no disguise — who feared only injustice, who 
hated tyranny ! 

The daily development of events breathed alone hos- 
tility toward England. In July, 1775, a Provisional 
Government was established in Maryland. In the Pro- 
visional Convention was vested the supreme power. 
The chief executive authority of the Province was 
vested in a Committee of Safety elected by the Conven- 
tion. Thomas Johnson was a member of the Executive 
Committee. 

A reconciliation was still hoped for, though the cry 
" to arms " had already been raised against the powers 
of Great Britain. 

Chancellor Hanson of Maryland, in his introductory 
remarks to the Journals of the Convention, says: 
" Such an administration, the immediate offspring of 
necessity, might have been reasonably expected to be 
subversive of that liberty which it was intended to 
secure. But in the course of more than two years, 
during which it existed, it was cheerfully submitted to 
by all, except the advocates of British usurpation; 
although many occasions occurred in which an intem- 
perate zeal transported men beyond the just bounds of 
moderation, not a single person fell a victim to the 
oppression of this irregular government. The truth is, 
that during the whole memorable interval between the 
fall of the old and the institution of the new form of 
government, there appeared to exist amongst us such a 
fund of public virtue as has scarcely a parallel in the 
annals of the world." In the executive branch of this 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 55 

government, Thomas Johnson was, down to January, 
1776, a chief actor in its administration. The whole 
atmosphere of Maryland was pervaded by a rational 
liberty which respected difference of opinion as a right 
belonging to every colonist. And no one was more 
fully impressed with the sacredness of this right than 
Thomas Johnson. 

Thomas Johnson, August 18th, 1775, at Annapolis, 
wrote to Horatio Gates a letter from which are taken 
the following extracts : 

" I shall be very unhappy that petitioning the King, 
to which measure I was a friend, should give you or 
any one else attached to the cause of America and 
liberty the least uneasiness. You and I, and America 
in general, may almost universally wish in the first 
place to establish our liberties ; our second wish is, a 
reunion with Great Britain ; so may we preserve the 
empire entire, and the constitutional liberty, founded 
in whiggish principles handed down to us by our 
ancestors. In order to strengthen ourselves to accom- 
plish these great ends, we ought, in my opinion, to 
conduct ourselves so as to unite America and divide 
Britain ; this, as it appears to me, may most likely be 
effected by doing rather more than less in the peaceable 
line, than would be required if our petition is rejected 
with contempt, which I think most likely. Will not 
our friends in England be still more exasperated against 
the Court ? And will not our very moderate men on 
this side of the water be compelled to own the necessity 
of opposing force to force? The rejection of the New 
York petition was very serviceable to America. If our 
petition should be granted, the troops will be recalled, 
the obnoxious acts repealed, and Ave restored to the 
footing of 1763. If the petition should not be granted, 
but so far attended to as to lay the ground-work of a 



56 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

negotiation, Britain must, I think, be ruined by the 
delay; if she subdues us at all, it must be by a violent 
and sudden exertion of her force; and if we can keep 
up a strong party in England, headed by such char- 
acters as Lord Chatham and the others in the present 
opposition, Bute, Mansfield and North, and a corrupt 
majority cannot draw the British force fully into 
action against us. Our friends will certainly continue 
such as long as they see we do not desire to break from 
a reasonable and beneficial connection with the mother 
country; but if, unhappily for the whole Empire, they 
should once be convinced by our conduct that we de- 
sign to break from that connection, I am apprehensive 
they will thenceforth become our most dangerous 
enemies — the greatest and first law of self-preservation 
will justify, nay compel it. The cunning Scotchman 
and Lord North fully feel the force of this reasoning ; 
hence their industry to make it believed in England that 
we have a scheme of Independence, a general term they 
equivocally use, to signify to the friends of liberty a 
breaking off of all connection, and to tories that we dis- 
pute the supremacy of Parliament. In the Declaratory 
Act is the power of binding us by its acts, in all cases 
whatever — the latter we do most certainly dispute, and 
I trust shall successfully fight against with the appro- 
bation of every honest Englishman. Lord North's pro- 
position, and consequent resolution of Parliament, were 
insidiously devised to wear the face of peace, and em- 
barrass us in the choice of evils — either to accept and 
be slaves, or reject and increase the number and power 
of our enemies. I flatter myself that your petition will 
present to him only a choice of means injurious to his 
villainous schemes. 

" Our Convention met the very day of my getting 
home. The meeting was very full ; we sat close many 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 57 

days, by six o'clock in the morning, and by candlelight 
in the evening. Our people were very prompt to do 
everything desired; they have appropriated £100,000 
for the defence of this Province, a great part of it to be 
laid out in the military line immediately, paid con- 
tingently, and the vr est for establishing manufactories 
of salt, saltpetre, and gunpowder. 

" We have an association ascertaining the necessity 
and justifiableness of repelling force by force, to be 
universally signed ; and strict resolutions with regard to 
our militia, which is to be as comprehensive here as 
perhaps in any country in the world, when called into 
action. We are to be subject to the Congressional rules 
and regulations for the army. A Committee of Safety, 
composed of sixteen, is, in the recess of the Convention, 
to have the supreme direction. We yet retain the forces 
of our Government, but there is no real force or efficacy 
in it ; if the intelligence we have from England looks 
to war, I dare say this Province will not hesitate to dis- 
charge all officers, and go boldly into it at once. . . . 

" The spirit has run through our young men so much, 
that if the business proceeds, notwithstanding the 
scarcity of men in this and the other Southern Prov- 
inces, I believe we must furnish you with a battalion or 
two; if, as I hope, those who are gone acquire reputa- 
tion, many of our youth will be on fire. The difficulty 
now is to regulate and direct the spirit of the people at 
large; and I verily believe, that instead of their being 
discouraged by a check on our military achievements, a 
sore rub would inflame them nearly to madness and 
desperation." ■ — - 

On the 10th day of May, 1776, the Continental Con- 
gress to the Colonies generally, recommended an abol- 
ishment of the oaths of allegiance to the Crown, the 
total suppression of authority under the EDglish Gov- 
5 



58 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

eminent, and the establishment of permanent constitu- 
tions. 

The Maryland Convention, with its ancient pride and 
jealousy of rights, regarded this recommendation as an 
attempt at interference with the internal regulations of 
the Colonies. 

A remonstrance, in reply, was put forth by the Mary- 
land Convention on the 21st of May. The exclusive 
right of the people of Maryland to regulate its internal 
government was asserted. 

With a sense of political independence, which seems 
native to Maryland soil, the Convention of that Colony 
declared the independence of the Province on the 6th 
day of July, 1776. 

The final action of the Continental Congress had not 
then been learned. The Declaration of Independence 
had been fully ratified two days before. 

" We have thought (says the Declaration) it just and 
necessary to empower our deputies in Congress to join 
with a majority of the United Colonies in declaring 
them free and independent States, in framing such fur- 
ther confederation between them, in making foreign 
alliances, and in adopting such other measures as shall 
be judged necessary for the preservation of their liber- 
ties : provided the sole and exclusive right of regulating 
the internal polity and government of this Colony be 
reserved to the people thereof. ... No ambitious 
views, no desire of independence, induced the people of 
Maryland to form a union with the other Colonies. To 
procure an exemption from parliamentary taxation, and 
to continue to the Legislatures of these Colonies the 
sole and exclusive right of regulating their internal 
polity, was our original and only motive." 

In this declaration the independence of the State is 
proclaimed: with a final crash fell the dominion of 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 59 

England, and with it the power of the Proprietary 
Government. 

A proposition of the Convention of June the 27th, 
1776, for militia for the flying camp, to be furnished by 
the Province, was approved. 

Thomas Johnson was elected Brigadier-General to 
command the said militia. This, however, was not to 
be, for on the 4th of July, 1776, Thomas Johnson was 
elected by the Convention as a deputy from the Province 
to the Continental Congress. 

The following resolution was then passed : 
"Considering that the said Thomas Johnson, Esq., 
cannot discharge the duty of Brigadier-General of the 
forces to be raised in this Province, in consequence of 
the resolves of Congress of the 7th day of June last, to 
which command the Convention, from a confidence in 
his capacity and abilities to fill the same with advantage 
to the public cause and honor to himself, had appointed 
him, and also execute the trust reposed in him as a 
deputy in Congress for this Province; and being of 
opinion that it is of very great importance to the wel- 
fare of this Province that it should not be deprived of 
the advice and assistance of the said Thomas Johnson 
in the public councils of the United Colonies, and that 
his place can be supplied with less inconvenience in the 
military than in the civil department; therefore Re- 
solved, That a Brigadier-General be elected by ballot in 
the room of the said Thomas Johnson, Esq." John 
Dent was elected in his place. 

The Convention next called a new Convention for the 
establishment of a permanent government in the State. 
The old Convention became a portion of the Provisional 
Government, The Committee of Safety remained in 
existence. 
Thomas Johnson was a member of the new Conven- 



60 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

tion which assembled at Annapolis on the 14th day of 
August, 1776. The appointing of a committee to pre- 
pare a form of government and a Bill of Eights, was 
the first act of the new Convention. Of this Committee 
Thomas Johnson was a member. On the 10th of Sep- 
tember their report was made. Copies of the same in 
the form of circulars were printed and distributed 
throughout the State. 

After having learned the opinion of the people with 
regard to the form of government and Bill of Eights, 
the Convention re-assembled, when the form and bill 
were adopted with but little alteration, and with only a 
partial change remained the same until 1838.^ The 
great American statesman, Alexander Hamilton, and 
the Scotch philosopher, Dugald Stuart, both pro- 
nounced it the wisest of all the constitutions estab- 
lished by the States after their separation from the 
Crown of England. Accordii g to the provisions of the 
new Constitution, the two Houses of the Legislature 
selected on the 13th of February the first Governor of 
the State. Thomas Johnson was chosen to fill that 
high and dignified office. On Friday, the 21st of March, 
1777, he was proclaimed with great honor the first 
Governor of the State of Maryland. The inauguration 
took place in the State House, at Annapolis, in the pres- 
ence of many distinguished personages. 

In his history of Maryland, McSherry thus refers to 
this important event : " The announcement was hailed 
by three volleys from the soldiery drawn up in front of 
the State House, and a salute of thirteen rounds was 
fired from the batteries in honor of the new confed- 
eracy. A sumptuous entertainment was then partaken, 
and the festivities of the day were closed with a splendid 
ball ; a renewal of the ancient and pleasant amusement, 
for which Annapolis, the Athens of the Colonies, had 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 61 

been so widely celebrated in the da) T s of the Proprie- 
taries, but which had been solemnly discontinued in 
the dark hours of the opening struggle." 

The Congress was once more in session in the city of 
Philadelphia. Fearing for the safety of that city, the 
great Commanding General, gathering all the militia 
that could be obtained, fixed his camp near Middle- 
brook.. In the shadow of the approaching peril he 
wrote to Governor Johnson the following letter, dated 
at Morristown, April 11th, 1777 : 

Sir:— The latest accounts received respecting the enemy, 
rendered prohable by a variety of circumstances, inform us 
that they are very busily engaged in fitting up their transports 
at Aniboy for the accommodation of trcops, that they have com- 
pleted theif bridge, and are determined to make their first push 
at Philadelphia. The campaign is therefore opening, and our 
present situation weaker than when you left us, forces me to 
entreat your utmost attention to the raising and equipping of the 
Continental troops allotted to be raised in your State. I have 
waited in painful expectation of reinforcements, such as would 
probably have insured a happy issue to any attack I might have 
determined upon, and such as I'had a right to expect, had the 
officers faithfully discharged their duty \ but that time is past, 
and I must content myself with improving on the future chances 
of war. Even this cannot be done unless the officers can be 
persuaded to abandon their comfortable quarters and take the 
field. Let me, therefore, in the most earnest terms beg that they 
may be forwarded to the army without loss of time. I have also 
to ask of you to transmit to me a list of the field-officers of your 
battalions, and their rank, with the number of their respective 
battalions. I have the honor to be, etc. 

Admiral Howe appearing on the 21st of August, 
1777, in the Chesapeake with several hundred sail, 
Governor Johnson issued a proclamation. 

The militia were called to arms, and two companies, 
at least, out of every batallion were ordered to march 
at once to the head of the Chesapeake — "To defend 
5* 



62 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

our liberties requires our exertions. Our wives, our 
children, and our country implore our assistance. 
Motives amply sufficient to arm every one who can be 
called a man!" — So spoke the proclamation, and when 
its trumpet voice was heard resounding with the 
vehemence borrowed of war, an answering call came 
from every mountain, forest and stream of that loyal 
State that never swerves from duty! 

On the 17th of March, 1778, the Legislature once 
more met at Annapolis. An appeal had been made to 
the State by Congress for an increase of the army. 
The quota demanded of Maryland was two thousand 
nine hundred and two w.en. Maryland had at this 
time a double foe to face. The State was distracted by 
internal troubles, caused by a resistance to its authority. 
The power placed in the hands of the Governor at this 
time was almost limitless. "These extensive powers 
(says McSherry) were placed, without hesitation, in the 
hands of Thomas Johnson, who had been re-elected 
Governor by the Legislature in the preceeding Fall, 
and whose sterling patriotism and public virtue merited 
the confidence which was reposed in him. It was not 
abused. Indeed the exigencies of the revolution fre- 
quently called forth exhibitions of integrity and self- 
devotedness worthy of the old Eoman patriots and 
sages." 

Three, years had passed since the inauguration of 
Johnson as Governor. He was twice re-elected with- 
out opposition. The Constitution now restricted him 
from longer being eligible. Thomas Sim Lee was 
elected his successor on the 8th of November, 1779. 

The two Houses of the Legislature, in testimony of 
the regard in which the administration of Governor 
Johnson was conducted, transmitted to him an address. 
In this eulogy his " prudence, assiduity, firmness, and 
integrity," are revealed in rare words of praise. 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 63 

The present Constitution of the United States of 
America was decided upon in Convention at Philadel- 
phia the 17th of September, 1787. Copies of it were 
transmitted to the several Legislatures of the States. 
A Convention of Delegates chosen by the people of each 
State would decide upon the Constitution thus submit- 
ted to them, according to the resolves of the Federal 
Convention. 

In a letter from Annapolis dated December 11, 1787, 
addressed to General Washington, Governor Johnson 
said : " The scale of power which I always suggested 
would be the most difficult to settle between the great 
and small States as such, was in my opinion very prop- 
erly adjusted. I believe there is no American of ob- 
servation, reflection, and candor, but will acknowledge 
man unhappily needs more government than he im- 
agines. I flatter myself that the plan recommended 
will be adopted in twelve of the thirteen States, without 
conditions sine qua non. But let the event be as it 
may, I shall think myself, with Americans in general, 
greatly indebted to the Convention, and possibly we 
may confess it when it may be too late to avail ourselves 
of their moderation and wisdom." 

At Annapolis, Monday, the 21st of April, 1778, as- 
sembled the Maryland Convention. To this Conven- 
tion, as he had been so often before, Thomas Johnson 
was sent as a delegate. The important weight of his 
judgment and influence is clearly manifested in the 
following letter from General Washington to that brave 
and honorable gentleman: 



to v 



Mount Vernon, 20th April, 1788. 

Dear Sir: — As well from report as from ideas expressed to 

me in your letter of December last, I am led to conclude that 

you are disposed, circumstanced as our public affairs arc at 

present, to ratify the Constitution, which has been Bubmitled to 



64 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

the people by the Federal Convention, and under tbis impres- 
sion, I take the liberty of expressing a single sentiment on the 
occasion. It is that an adjournment of your Convention, if at- 
tempted, to a later period than the decision of the question in 
this State, will be tantamount to the rejection of the Constitu- 
tion. I have good reason for this opinion, and I am told it is 
the blow which the leading characters of the opposition in the 
next State have meditated, if it shall be found that a direct 
attack is not likely to succeed in yours. If this be true it can- 
not be too much deprecated and guarded against The post- 
ponement in New Hampshire, although it had no reference to 
the Convention in this State, but proceeded altogether from the 
local circumstances of its own, is ascribed by the opposition here 
to complaisance toward Virginia, and gnat use is made of h. 
An event similar to this in Maryland would have the wors* 
tendency imaginable; for indecision there would certainly have 
considerable influence on South Carolina, the only other State 
which is to precede Virginia, and submits the question almost 
wholly to the determination of the latter, The pride of the 
State is already touched upon this string, and will be raised 
much higher if there is fresh cause. 

The sentiments of Kentucky are not yet known here. Inde- 
pendent of these, the parties in this State, from the known or 
presumed opinions of the members, are pretty equally balanced. 
The one in favour of the Constitution preponderates at present ; 
but a little matter cast into the opposite scale may make it the 
heaviest. 

If in suggesting these hints I have exceeded the proper* limit, 
I shall yet hope to be excused. I have but one public wish re- 
maining. It is, that in peace and retirement I may see this 
country rescued from the danger that is pending, and rise in 
respectability, maugre the intrigues of its public and private 
enemies. I am, with very great esteem and regard, etc." 

Eight days after the date of this letter the Constitu- 
tion "was ratified by Maryland by a vote of sixty-three to 
eleven, and the certificate was signed by the members 
of the Convention on the 28th of April, 1788. 

The force of Governor Johnson's influence is thus 
shown in dealing with a State so slow to yield as Mary- 
land. 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 65 

As Governor Johnson had nominated Washington to 
be Commander-in-Chief of all the Continental armies, 
he was amongst the first who named him as the first 
President of the United States. In a letter to George 
Washington on the subject, dated October the 10th, 
1788, he says: "We cannot, Sir, do without you, and I 
and thousands more can explain to anybody but your- 
self why we cannot do without you." 

As Washington had not relied in vain upon Johnson 
in the fiery days of war, now that peace was come he 
sought his aid as of yore. 

In 1789 he tendered him the office of United States 

District Judge. The following is the President's letter 

on the subject: 

New York, September 28th, 1789. 

Dear Sir: — In assenting to the opinion that due administra- 
tion of justice is the strongest cement of good government, 
you will also agree with me that the first organization of the 
judicial department is essential to the happiness of our country, 
and to the stability of our political system. Hence the selection 
of the fittest characters to expound the laws and dispense justice, 
has been au invariable object of my concern. Consulting your 
domestic inclinations, and the state of your health, I yielded on 
a recent occasion, persuaded by your friends that you would not 
be prevailed on to leave your State to mingle in the administra- 
tion of public affairs. But I fouud it impossible in selecting a 
character to preside in the District Court to refuse the public 
wish and the conviction of my own mind, the necessity of 
nominating you to that office, and I cannot but flatter myself 
that the same reasons which have led you to former sacrafices 
in the public service will now operate to induce your accept- 
ance of au appointment so highly interesting to your country. 

As soon as the acts which are necessary accompaniments of 
the appointment can be got ready, you will receive official notice 
of the latter. This letter is only to be considered as an early 
communication of my sentiments on this occasion, and as a 
testimony of the sincere esteem and regard with which I am, 
dear sir, your most obedient servant, 

GEORGE WASHINGTON. 



66 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

Notwithstanding the urgency of this letter, Governor 
Johnson declined the judgeship tendered to him. 

Under the Constitution of Maryland, which Governor 
Johnson aiding in framing, and under which he was 
the first Governor, the judicial department of the gov- 
ernment was composed of a Court of Appeals, a Court 
of Chancery, and a General Court. The General Court, 
like the Provincial Court which it superseded, had 
original jurisdiction in both civil and criminal cases of 
a certain grade over the whole State. In Mr. Tyler's 
Memoir of Chief Justice Taney, the Chief Justice, in 
the first chapter, which he wrote himself, says of this 
Court : " The Court consisted of three judges, always 
selected from the eminent men of the Bar ; the jurors 
from each county were taken from the most respectable 
and intelligent class of society; and, generally speak- 
ing, the jury who tried the cause probably never heard 
of it before they were empanneled, and had no knowl- 
edge whatever of the parties, except what they gathered 
from the testimony. There was every security, there- 
fore, for an impartial trial. The extent of the jurisdic- 
tion, and the importance of the cases tried in it, 
brought together, at its sessions, all that were eminent 
or distinguished at the Bar on either of the shores for 
which it was sitting 



"The first session of the General Court, after I went 
to Annapolis, made a strong impression upon me. The 
three judges, wearing scarlet cloaks, sat in chairs placed 
on an elevated platform; and all the distinguished 
lawyers of Maryland were assembled at the Bar." 

On the 20th of April, 1790, Thomas Johnson was 
appointed by the Governor of Maryland, with the ad- 
vice of the Senate, Chief Judge of this Court. Al- 
though, in October of the following year, he resigned 
the judgeship, before him had been argued many im- 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 67 

portant cases by such famous lawyers as William 
Pinkney, Samuel Chase, and Martin Luther. 

Notwithstanding his urgent desire to retire from 
public life, he yielded to the importunities of Wash- 
ington, and accepted the position of Associate Judge 
of the Supreme Court of the United States. Having 
at one time declined the place on account of circuit 
duty, Washington wrote as follows in reply to the ob- 
jection: "Upon considering the arrangements of the 
judges with respect to the ensuing circuit, and the 
probability of future relief from these disagreeable 
tours, I thought it best to direct your commission to be 
made out and transmitted to you, which has accordingly 
been done ; and I have no doubt that the public will be 
benefitted, and the wishes of your friends gratified by 
your acceptance. With sentiments of very great re- 
gard, etc." 

Judge Johnson's predecessor in office was John Rut- 
ledge, of South Carolina, a zealous patriot. His health 
finally failing, Mr. Johnson tendered his resignation by 
letter to the President on the 16th of January, 1793. 
In reply, Washington wrote : 

Philadelphia, February 1, 1793. 
Dear Sir:— Whilst I ackhowledge the receipt of your letter 
of 16th January, I cannot but express the regret with which I 
received the resignation of your office, and sincerely lament 
the causes that produced it. It is unnecessary for me to say 
how much I should have been pleased had your health permitted 
you to continue in office ; for besides the difficulty of providing 
a character to fill the distinguished and important station of 
Judge, in whom are combined the necessary professional, local, 
and other requisites, the resignation of persons holding that 
high, office conveys to the public mind a want of stability in ' 
that department, where, perhaps, it is more essential than in 
any other. With sentiments of pure esteem and regard, and 
sincere wishes for your health and happiness, I am, sir, }*our 
most obedient servaut, etc. 



68 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

In the year 1795, Edmund Bandolph, of Virginia, re- 
signed the office of Secretary of State. At once Wash- 
ington tendered to the Honorable Thomas Johnson the 
position made vacant. The following letter on the sub- 
ject is from the pen of Washington : 

PRIVATE. 

Philadelphia, 24 August, 1705. 
My Dear Sir:— The office of Secretary of State is -vacant, 
occasioned by the resignation of Mr. Randolph. Will you ac- 
cept it? You know my wishes of old to bring yon into the 
administration. Where then is the necessity of repeating them ? 
No time more than the present ever required the aid of your 
abilities, nor of the old and proved talents of the country. To 
have yours would be pleasing to me, and I verily believe would 
be agreeable also to the community at large. It is with you to 
decide. If in the affirmative, return to me the inclosed letter, 
and I will communicate further on this subject the moment you 
inform me thereof. If it is in the negative, be so good as to 
forward the letter by the post agreeably to its address ; and at 
any rate, write to me the result of your determination as soon 
as you can after the receipt of this letter, as I remain here to 
get this and some other matters arranged before I go to Virginia 
for my family. With sincere esteem and regard, I am, etc. 

This honor Mr. Johnson declined — an honor which 
it is said had once before been tendered him by the 
greatest of our Presidents. 

In declining the office, Governor Johnson, in a letter 
dated 29th of August, 1795, says: "I feel real concern 
that my circumstances will not permit me to fill the 
important office you propose to me. I am far from 
being out of humor with the world on my own account ; 
it has done me more than justice in estimating my 
abilities, and more justice than common in conjecturing 
my motives. I feel nothing of fear either in hazarding 
again the little reputation I may haye acquired, for I 
am not conscious of having sought or despised ap- 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 69 

plause ; but, without affectation, I do not think I could 
do credit to the office of Secretary. I cannot persuade 
myself that I possess the necessary qualifications for it, 
and I am sure I am too old to expect improvement. 
My strength declines, and so, too, probably, will my 
mental powers soon. My views in this world have been 
some time bounded to my children. They yet, for a 
little while, may have me to lean on. Being constantly 
with them adds to their happiness, and makes my chief 
comfort." 

One of the projects of Washington's statesmanship 
was the connection of the waters of the Potomac and 
the Ohio rivers. Johnson, too, favored the plan. From 
Mount Vernon Washington wrote to Thomas Jefferson, 
then in the Congress of the United States, respecting 
the practicability of an easy and short communication 
between the waters of the Ohio and Potomac, of the 
advantages of that communication and the preference 
it has over all others, and of the policy there would be 
in this State (Virginia) and Maryland to adopt and 
render it facile. He speaks of Thomas Johnson as " a 
warm promoter of the scheme on the North side of the 
Potomac;" and adds, "I wish, if it should fall in 
your way, that you would discourse with Mr. Thomas 
Johnson, formerly Governor of Maryland, on the 
subject." 

The date of this letter was March 29th, 1784. 
Through their great efforts the Potomac Company was 
incorporated in 1784 by Maryland and Virginia, as a 
means of connecting the waters of the Potomac and the 
Ohio. 

George Washington Parke Custis, in his "Recollec- 
tions and Private Memoirs of the Life and Character of 
Washington," thus writes: "The canoe or pirogue, in 
which General Washington and a party of friends made 
6 



70 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

the first survey of the Potomac to ascertain the practi- 
cability of a navigation above tide -water, was hollowed 
out of a large poplar tree under the direction of General 
Johnson, of Frederick county, Maryland. This humble 
bark was placed upon a wagon, hauled into the stream, 
and there received its honored freight. The General 
was accompanied in the interesting and important re- 
connoissance by General (the late Governor) Johnson, of 
Maryland, one of the first Commissioners of the city of 
Washington, and several other gentlemen. At night- 
fall, it was usual for the party to land and seek quarters 
of some of the planters or farmers who lived near the 
banks of the river, in all the pride and comfort of old- 
fashioned kindliness and hospitality." 

In July, 1785, General Washington, accompanied by 
the Directors of the Potomac Company, made a tour of 
inspection, following closely the course of the Potomac 
from Georgetown to the beautiful region of Harper's 
Ferry. The Directors proceeded a portion of the way 
by land. Having made a thorough survey they re- 
turned to the head of the Great Falls above George- 
town. 

Washington in his Diary, says : "August 5th. — After 
breakfast, and after directing Mr. Eumsey, when he had 
marked the way and set the laborers at work, to meet us 
at Harper's Ferry, myself and the directors set out for 
the same place by way of Fredericktown in Maryland; 
dined at a Dutchman's two miles above the mouth of 
Monococy, and reached Fredericktown about 5 o'clock. 
Drank tea, supped and lodged at Governor Johnson's. 
The next day Governor Johnson and the party started 
to examine the Shenandoah Falls." 

On the 11th of December, 1787, Governor Johnson in 
a letter, said : " The present circumstances with respect 
to the future seat of Congress, in my opinion, call for 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 71 

vigorous exertions to perfect the navigation of the 
Potomac speedily. Surely five or six hundred miles of 
inland navigation, added to the central situation and 
other advantages, would decide in favor of Potomac for 
the permanent seat of government." 

Thus was begun the construction of the Chesapeake 
and Ohio Canal, in conjunction with the location, per- 
manently, of the seat of government overlooking the 
waters of the Potomac. 

Washington, who unselfishly looked ever forward to 
the advancement of his country's interests, chose from 
among the many the strongest and the best as his 
workers. When the permanent seat of the Federal 
Government was to be laid out he appointed Thomas 
Johnson, David Stewart and Daniel Carroll as what 
were termed " The Commissioners of the Federal Dis- 
trict." In the execution of their duties the Commis- 
sioners addressed a letter to Major L'Enfant, the 
Engineer, dated February the 9th, 1791, from which 
the following extract is taken : 

"We have agreed that the Federal District shall be 
called The Territory of Columbia, and the Federal city, 
The City of Washington. The title of the map, there- 
fore, will be ' A Map of the City of Washington in the 
Territory of Columbia.' We have also agreed the 
streets be named alphabetically one way, and numeric- 
ally the other; the former divided into North and 
South letters, the latter into East and West numbers, 
from the Capitol." 

It will thus be seen that Johnson aided in bestowing 
upon the Capital of our Nation the name of its wisest 
chief. 

When Washington died in 1799, Governor Johnson 
delivered at Frederick city, in Maryland, a eulogy on 
his life and character. As companion heroes on the 



72 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

field of battle, the battle-field of life, and on the page 
of history, George Washington of Virginia and Thomas 
Johnson of Maryland stand side by side. 

After the tumult of public life was over, Governor 
Johnson lived in felicitous peace at his country-seat. 
This estate, known as Rose Hill, was situated at the 
summit of Frederick town, in Maryland. His home 
was such as is often pictured, yet seldom realized, as a 
resting-place for a great man after the turmoil and vex- 
ations of a busy life. The family motto of " Trust and 
Strive" seemed ever in his memory. 

The following letter, written during the war of 1812 
to his daughter, the late Mrs. Hugh W. Evans, of Balti- 
more, has been kindly furnished to the author, as well 
as other letters in this sketch, by Mrs. E. Wethered, 
the daughter of Mrs. Evans, and is evidence of the 
deep domestic affection of Governor Johnson : 

Frederick, September 2nd, 1813. 

Your letter, my dear child, of 25th August, reached me yester- 
day. It afforded me great satisfaction, as it ascertained me of 
your being amongst your friends in Baltimore, where I expect 
they and yourself will be in safety at least for a while; for I do 
not suppose the enemy will undertake anything of great hazard 
or difficulty in the course of this month, lest a Northeast storm 
should defeat their project and perhaps their future hopes. 

The notice taken of me lately in the newspapers adds nothing 
to my self-complacency; indeed, I wish, rather, that I had not 
been mentioned at all. I acquit myself altogether of laying any 
trap to catch praise; well knowing that well deserved excites 
envy, and if excessive, is like coarse, bad painting, it hightens 
small defects into deformity, 'i hough a very old man my mind 
is not so gone as to be flattered by praise. I love the good 
opinion of the world when it follows my own, but I must be 
older before it leads. It is the fault of the present day that we 
are all geese or swans, according to our party — however, enough 
on this subject. I love and much appreciate family pride, to the 
extent as an additional guard against doing anything improper. 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 16 

I hope to leave to every descendant of mine the inheritance of 
not blushing for their biood having passed through my veins. 
!So far, and so far only, be proud of your family, which happily 

affords you a like incentive in other branches of it 

Your sisters gi.e me great satisfaction. Their teacher has 
found the way to excite emulation for scholars, perhaps to the 
degree of envy, amongst some of her scholars. It has not, I 
believe, risen to that degree with my girls, and I hope it will 
not. Their application is equal to any thing I could wish. 
They each have a fair prospect of gaining all that could be 
reasonably expected. I reckon it among my comforts, of which 
I thank God I yet enjoy a great share. 

There needs no great cunning to go through the world with 
self-approbation and credit. Indeed, cunning will sometimes 
prevent a regard for truth and sincerity, which surpass in value 
all the cunning of the most dextrous politician and are open to 
the practice of every honest mind. 

May heaven bless you. My good wishes to all enquiring 
friends. Your very affectionate father, 

THOS. JOHNSON. 

Mrs. Ann G. Ross, residing in Frederick city, Mary- 
land, a grand-daughter of Governor Johnson, gives to 
the writer of this sketch the following account of her 
grandfather's lineage : 

" Thomas J ohnson the elder, was from a place called 
Porte Head, Yarmouth, England. He was a barrister, 
in good practice, and had a brother who held a position 
of consequence in the Department of Foreign Affairs, 
in the reign of Queen Anne. Thomas Johnson eloped 
with a chancery ward, which made it necessary for him 
to come to America, which he did with his wife, under 
the protection of Capt. Roger Baker, his wife's father, 
who commanded the vessel. This seems strange, but 
we infer that although marrying the chancery ward was 
a penal offense, still the alliance met with her father's 
approbation. This was probably about 1660. They 
died and were buried at St. Leonard's Creek, Calvert 
6* 



74 THOMAS JOHNSON. 

county, leaving one son 12 years of age, Thomas John- 
son, who grew up and married Dorcas Sedgewick, of 
Calvert county. They had twelve children, the fifth 
of whom was afterward Governor Johnson, and was 
born November 4th, 1732, and married Ann Jennings, 
daughter of Thomas Jennings, of Annapolis. 

"We have a few of Gen. Washington's letters to 
grandpa, but he purposely destroyed all confidential 
letters before his death." 

Thomas Johnson was born in Calvert county, Mary- 
land, November 4th, 1732. He had three brothers : 
Joshua, born in 1742; Baker, born 1747; and Roger, 
born in 1749 ; all in the county of Calvert. 

The two last-named studied law in the office of their 
brother, Thomas, in Annapolis. Settling afterward 
in Frederick city, Maryland, they practiced their pro- 
fession. Joshua having gone early in life to London, 
there entered commercial life. He was, after that, for 
many years, the Consular Agent from America. He 
was noted, particularly amongst his countrymen abroad, 
for the most generous hospitality. His daughter be- 
came the wife of John Quincy Adams, who was after- 
ward the President of the United States. 

General Bradley T. Johnson, late of the Confederate 
army, is a descendant of this family. Governor John- 
son belonged to a wealthy family ; he was thus enabled 
to equip, and maintain at his own expense, the military 
forces which he led to the relief of General Washington 
in New Jersey. 

On the 2Gth of October, 1819, Governor Johnson 
died at his residence, Rose Hill. He was in the eighty- 
seventh year of his age. The grave of this patriot (so 
wise, so pure, so honored, so beloved !) is in the cemetery 
at Frederick City. 

This resting-place of the dead overlooks the rich and 



THOMAS JOHNSON. 75 

beautiful valley lying between the Licganore Hills and 
the Catoctin Mountains. Here in the shadow of high 
trees, where nature's sweetest tones fill the air, the old 
hero sleeps long and well. 

Requiescat in Pace. 




FAIR MARYLAND, 



YOUR loyalty and valor, 
A heritage for kings, 
Mothtr land, fair Maryland, 
A poet loves and sings ! 

The grandest truths are simple, 
And in their grandest guise 

Are only simple lessons 
Of wisdom to the wise ! 

Soldiers of dear Maryland, 
In nature's bravest mould, 

You wear the fame of princes, 
Nor bought with prince's gold ! 

Vain pomp and gilded titles 
May win to-day's renown, 

Yet noble thoughts and actions 
In weighing bear them down. 

Who scoff at lofty manners, 
The proof of gentle caste, 

Are pigmies in the shadows 
Of giants of the Past ! 

Wives, mothers, and fair daughters, 
Good, beautiful, and true, 

The earth hath yielded laurels 
And roses unto you ! 

God send you grace and wisdom, 
From His most regal Throne, 

Whose " love is love forever ! " 
Whose peace is Peace alone ! 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 




" His stately mien as well implied, 
A high-born heart, a martial pride, 

As if a baron's crest be wore." 

N his " Chronicles of Baltimore," Scharf says : 
"On the 13th of January, 1695, Charles 
Carroll surveyed one thousand acres of land 
lying in Baltimore county, on the north side 
of Patapsco river, in the woods upon Jones' Falls, and 
on the west side of the said Falls, which was called * Ely 
0' Carroll/" 

The origin of the name given to this tract of land is 
of peculiar interest, being closely linked with the 
earliest history of Erin. Helia, or Ely O'Carroll, was 
the name given to an extensive tract of country in 
Ireland, comprising King's county, portions of Queen's 
county and Tipperary. 

O'Hart, in his book of "Irish Pedigrees," says: 
" The Territory of * Ely ' got its name from Eile, one 
of its princes in the fifth century; and from being pos- 
sessed by the O'Carroll's, was called ' Ely O'Carroll ; ' 
which comprised the present barony of Lower Ormond, 
in the county Tipperary, with the Barony of Clon- 
lisk, and part of Ballybrit, in the King's county, ex- 
tending to Slieve Bloom Mountains, on the borders of 



78 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

the Queen's county." The O'Carroll's descended from 
Kian, the third son of Olioll Olium, King of Minister. 
According to Sir William Beatham, Ulster king-at- 
arms, the grants of land made to Charles Carroll were 
in name and extent the same as those lost by his father 
in Ireland, namely, twenty thousand acres in each tract, 
Ely O'Carroll, Doughoreagan and Carrolston. The his- 
tory of this powerful Irish clan is given very fully by Sir 
William Beatham, in his "Irish Antiquarian Re- 
searches." 

About the year 1688, Charles O'Carroll is said to 
have come to this country from Ireland. His coming 
was through the influence of Lord Powis, of the Court 
of James II, King of England. Mr. Charles O'Carroll 
had been Secretary to Lord Powis, and through his in- 
fluence superseded Colonel Henry Darnall, as Register 
of the Land Office under the Proprietary Government. 
Although a Roman Catholic, he seems also to have 
maintained his influence with the rulers of the Province, 
appointed by William and Mary. 

Much that is of an interesting nature relating to the 
ancient clan of O'Carroll, is given in O'Hart's "Irish 
Pedigrees," before referred to. The original name of 
the family was Cearbheoil, which was that borne by one 
of its chiefs, and whose posterity afterward changed it 
to O'Carroll, the being finally dropped. The first 
one of the family who assumed the name of O'Carroll, 
was Monach, the son of the above-named chief. 

The following order for a land-grant, appears among 
the early records of the Proprietary: 

" In behalf of his lordship, Lord Proprietary of this 
province, you are hereby required to reserve for his lord- 
ship's use, the quantity of fifteen thousand acres of land, 
if the same can be found together in one entire tract, 
otherwise no less than ten thousand acres, lately sur- 



OF CARROLLTOX. 79 

yeyed for Charles Carroll, Esq., in Prince George's 
county, the same to be laid between such metes and 
bounds as may be most profitable to his lordship." — 
Lib. B. B., folio 81. 

And the following, transmitted from the past, wears 
a good deal of interest also upon its face : 

[L. S.] 

C. Baltimore. 

" Instructions, power and authority to be observed 
and pursued by Charles Carroll, my agent and receiver- 
general in Maryland, given by me this, the 12th day of 
September, 1712. 

" You are also hereby ordered and empowered, yearly to 
pay, in tobacco, the several allowances heretofore made 
by me, to the several persons and officers hereinafter 
mentioned, viz : 

Major Nicholas Sewall, 12,000 pounds of tobacco. 

Major Nicholas Sewall, 3,000 pounds of tobacco. 

Henry Sewell, 3,000 pounds of tobacco, for assistance to his 

father, in shipping at Patuxent. 
To my officer at Patuxent, 6,000 pounds of tobacco. 
To my officer at Potomack, 6,000 pounds of tobacco. 
To my officer at Annapolis, 3,000 pounds of tobacco. 
To my officer at Oxford, 3,000 pounds of tobacco. 
Mr. Anthony Neale, 3,000 pounds of tobacco, a gift or token of 

respect. 
Mr. Robert Brooke, 8,000 pounds of tobacco, for him and his 

brethren, being eight in number. 
Mr. James Haddock, 1,000 pounds of tobacco. 
Mr. George Mason, 1,000 pounds of tobacco. 
To yourself, 12,000 pounds of tobacco, for your advice and 

trouble about my law concerns. 
Mr. Cecil Butler, 4,000 pounds of tobacco. 
Mr. James Carroll, 10,000 pounds of tobacco, for keeping my 

rent-rolls in order. 

" I hereby grant a hundred acres of land to William 



80 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

Eichardson, in Anne Arnndel county, in lieu of a cer- 
tificate of a former grant, which his father alleges to 
have received of Heath cott, but which never appeared. 

" I also impower you, the same as I impowered my late 
agent, Col. Henry Darnell, upon the Crown Secretary 
and Chancellors, taking for their own use the fees prop- 
erly belonging to my land office, order and direct that 
an addiiion should be made to the price of warrants bo 
as to make up for the difference taken by the said Sec- 
retary and Chancellor, and to take and receive to, and 
for his and your own proper use and behoof. 

" You are to grant Cecil Butler a warrant for five hun- 
dred acres of land; you are also to grant him a lease 
for the plantation of St. John's, near the city of St. 
Mary's. 

" You are to grant Henry Wharton one hundred and 
forty-six acres of land. You are to grant Henry Sewell 
two or three hundred acres of escheat land. You are to 
grant Gerard Stye five hundred acres of escheat land, 
in consequence of a piece of five hundred sold by Charles 
Calvert to his father, which was in my Manor, but for 
which I have given Capt. Eichard Smith a compensation. 
I do hereby also confirm a grant passed by Col. Henry 
Darnell, to yourself, of two hundred acres of land near 
the city of St. Mary's." 

In the same order is noticed the petition of Eobert 
Goldsborough, and his wife Elizabeth, for an additional 
grant of lands. The order terminates thus: ""When 
the land that Sir John Oldcastle formerly held, shall 
be adjudged mine, I order Col. William Digges may 
have a patent for the same as a gift of 

C. Baltimore." 

The business talent and capacity of this first Charles 
Carroll, is made evident, and was handed down as a 
precious inheritance for two generations at least. His 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 81 

son, Charles Carroll, was born in the year 1702, succeed- 
ing to the rich estates of his father, which he retained 
by his energy and wise management. He married 
Elizabeth Brooke, and was residing at Annapolis, when 
Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, their son and only child, 
was born. This event occurred on the 20th day of Sep- 
tember, 1737. With the customary zealousness of a 
Catholic, Mr. Charles Carroll sent his son, the subject 
of this sketch, to the College of Saint Omer, in Flanders. 
The boy, then eight years of age, remained for about 
six years under the immediate instruction of the Jesuit 
Fathers of that Institution. He was afterward placed 
with the French Jesuits at Eheims, for the purpose of 
continuing his classical studies. Here, however, he did 
not remain long; he entered the College of Louis le 
Grand, at Paris, in the following year. Two years were 
spent at this Institution ; the young man then proceed- 
ing to Bruges, remained there awhile, engaged in the 
study of the civil law. He afterward returned to Paris, 
where he remained until the year 1757. The influence 
of wealth upon the common order of men was as great 
in the past as in the present. By those people who 
were blind alike to virtues and talents, Mr. Carroll was 
sought and flattered, and courted as a young man of 
wealth and fashion. The French " society " morals 

belonged to the French-school of morality, 

and Paris, with its thousand fascinations, was a danger- 
ous eddy to be caught in. Seen through the hallowing 
radiance of distant time, the virtues of those whom we 
have elevated to the ideal-standard of heroes, seem, in 
their sublimity, to have been proof against the common 
assaults of the " flesh and the devil." 

That our heroes succumbed occasionally, however, to 
the powers of evil, is beyond a doubt. According to 
his own statements, Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, 
7 



82 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

yielded to the seductive teachings of the times, and im- 
bibed, though not to an ineradicable degree, the poisonous 
doctrines of Voltaire, in opposition to his earlier train- 
ing. In this respect Mr. Carroll merely adopted the 
skeptic tone of the circle in which he moved. It must, 
however, be remembered that a deeply implanted faith 
does not easily perish. His faith was only sullied and 
dimmed by the corrupting dust of infidelity. 

Many years before his death he sought to make amends, 
by every means in his power, for the sins of his youth 
and ignorance, while in the frivolous city of Paris. In 
1757 he went again to London, where he remained, 
devoting his time to the study of the civil law, at the 
Temple. In the year 1764 Mr. Carroll returned to his 
native land. 

The heavy taxation demanded by England of her 
struggling colonies, now caused a universal murmur 
from every quarter of the land. In the common trouble 
the tie between the Colonies was strengthened ; religious 
differences seemed for the time almost forgotten, as side 
by side they ranked themselves against the mother-land. 
The feeling that had been long growing was fully de- 
veloped and matured by the Stamp Act of 1765. From 
Eidgely's Annals of Annapolis, the following extract is 
made : 

" On the 27th of August, in this year, a considerable 
number of people, ' Asserters of British American priv- 
ileges] met at Annapolis, to show their detestation of 
and abhorrence to some late tremendous attacks on lib- 
erty, and their dislike to a certain late arrived officer — 
a native of this province ! 

"They curiously dressed up the figure of a man, 
which they placed in a one-horse cart, malefactor liKe, 
with some sheets of paper in his hands, before his face ! 
In that manner they paraded through the streets of the 



CHAELES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 83 

town till noon, the bell at the same time tolling a sol- 
emn knell, when they proceeded to the hill, and after 
giving it the Mosaic Law at the whipping-post, placed 
it in the pillory, from whence they took it and hung it 
on a gibbet, there erected for that purpose, and set fire 
to a tar-barrel underneath, and burnt it till it fell into 
the barrel. By the many significant nods of the head, 
while in the cart, it may be said to have gone off very 
penitently." 

This stern resistance was carried on in so defiant a 
manner, that newly arrived vessels, fully freighted with 
valuable goods, were forced to return to England with 
their cargoes untouched. The Stamp Act was repealed 
and quiet was restored for the time. 

In the year 1768 Charles Carroll was married to Miss 
Mary Darnell, whose family name graces the earliest 
pages of Colonial history. She was the daughter of 
Henry Darnell. Mr. Carroll is said to have loved, be- 
fore this, a Miss Cooke, of Maryland, to whom he would 
doubtless have married had she lived ; she died, however, 
in 1766, and he married in 1768, which might lead us 
to suppose that he was as susceptible as he was attract- 
ive. He is described as a man of medium height, of 
pale and intellectual countenance, j enetrating grey eyes 
and delicate features. His manner was dignified and 
courtly. 

On the 9th of May, in the year 1769, a meeting was 
called at Annapolis for the purpose of forming non-im- 
portation associations. The call was duly responded to 
by representatives, in large numbers, from all of the 
counties. The resolutions were passed and carried into 
operation, and for a while the rules were strictly adhered 
to, but gradually, owing to the want of general co-oper- 
ation, the work was rendered ineffectual, and finally 
abandoned. 



84 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

At this time the State of Maryland was thrown into 
agitation by two leading questions, which were debated 
with all the warmth of eloquence that could be brought 
to bear in their behalf. These questions were: "The 
Proclamation Act," and the " Vestry Question." The 
colonists had, for a considerable time, complained of the 
exorbitant fees of some of the Colonial offices, the abuses 
in their collection, and the uncertainty of commutation. 
Before this time the Assembly had usually regulated 
the fees by temporary acts, thus retaining a power over 
the office-holders whose appointments were held under 
the Proprietary. 

These acts were allowed to expire about this time, 
consequently Governor Eden issued a proclamation de- 
claring that the fees should be regulated according to 
the expired acts. This caused an indignant outburst 
from the people, whose representatives were numbered 
among the men distinguished for intellectual attain- 
ments. Daniel Dulany, the eminent lawyer, Mr. Ham- 
mond, and other men of note advocated the Act as 
strenuously as it was opposed by Charles Carroll, of 
Carrolton, Samuel Chase and William Paca. The 
fiercest resistance was made against the reduction of 
fees by those most interested as office-holders — amongst 
them were Daniel Dulany, Secretary of the Province ; 
Walter Dulany, Commissary General, and the Land 
Officers, Calvert and Steuart. Their opponents, how- 
ever, proved as strong in eloquence, and more effective 
in other respects. The people were sustained almost 
universally by the lawyers of the State, whilst the 
Governor was supported by the officers, the Episcopal 
clergy and those who adhered to them or their cause. 
Yet as the imposers of unjust taxes are not apt to be 
enshrined in the affections of the people, it is not sur- 
prising that many who had hitherto been staunch up- 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 85 

holders of " the established church " should take this 
opportunity to right their wrongs if possible. 

Injustice it was that aroused the ire of Charles 
Carroll, of Carrolton. Eights infringed and compacts 
broken, warned the faithful young sentinel of further 
danger; and but for the tyrannous conduct of the 
British government, Charles Carroll might have proved 
himself as faithful and valuable a royalist as he was 
afterward a dangerous rebel. The sword had not yet 
been resorted to ; yet the pen, that mighty arbiter in 
behalf of the weak against the strong, the protector of 
the oppressed and avenger of wrong, did its work. As 
mighty needs require mighty remedies, strong souls are 
raised up in the hour of a Nation's trouble to battle in 
its defence. The questions of the hour were discussed 
in public print, through the means of pamphlets and 
in the columns of the Maryland Gazette, which was a 
leading journal in its day, and served as a battle or 
dueling ground, as the case might be, where learning 
and wit were the formidable weapons brought into 
use. 

As it was not hatred to England, but to some of its 
laws, that induced the people of America to resistance, 
as is the case when we oppose the wrongs of those 
whom we love, their opposition* was fiercer and stronger 
than would have been evinced toward a foreign foe. 
Full many a Colonist who opposed bitterly the taxation 
laws could have, if questioned, answered from his heart 
in the words of dear Sir Walter's hero : 

" My manors, balls, and bowers, sball still 
Be open, at my sovereign's will, 
To eacb one wbom he lists, howe'er 
Unmeet to be the owner's peer. 
My castles are my king's alone, 
From turret to foundation stone." 



86 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

Under the signature of the " First Citizen" Mr. 
Carroll contested in the public prints with Daniel 
Dulany, who took the name of " Ant Hon P The First 
Citizen, however, proved himself the more efficient of 
the two combatants, though Dulany's was acknowledged 
to be the master-mind of Maryland. On every side 
rose new foes who cast upon him the name of " Jesuit," 
" Papist," and whatever other epithet might arouse the 
indignation of the people. They failed, however, in 
their designs, and although he was taunted with the 
reminder that as a disfranchised man he was unable to 
"cast his puny vote," his resolve was unshaken. 

From this time, 1770, to the year 1774, there was a 
continual agitation of the tax question ; during which 
time Mr. Carroll's talents were brought into constant 
use in behalf of his country. On the 14th of October, 
1774, the brig Peggy Stewart arrived at Annapolis. In 
its cargo were a few packages of tea consigned to 
Thomas Williams and company, the duty having been 
paid by the owner of the vessel, Mr. Anthony Stewart. 
The indignation of the people was loudly expressed, 
nor was it soothed by the humble apologies of the de- 
linquents. By the advice of Charles Carroll, of Carroll- 
ton, Stewart was forced to set fire to his vessel, and in 
the presence of a multitude of people, the vessel was 
burned to the water's edge. The actors in this and 
other dramas of the kind were the leading citizens of 
Maryland; undisguised and with the full light of day 
shining upon their faces, they resisted oppressors and 
oppression ! In their resistance they were even more 
determined than the people of Charleston, South Caro- 
lina, who stored the tea in " damp cellars, where it was 
quietly permitted to rot." * 

On the 8th of December, 1774, the Convention re- 

* Alexander H. Stephens' History of United States. 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 8*7 

assembled for the purpose of preparation for " an 
armed resistance to the power of England." Charles 
Carroll, of Carrollton, having triumphed by the might 
of right, sat as an honorable member in the Convention. 
At this meeting full provision was made for the exer- 
cise of authority by the newly-formed government 
which had risen silently, yet surely, as a tower of 
strength by the side of the royal government. In the 
shadow of these two heads the people moved onward to 
death and glory! On to the grave! Soldiers for song 
and story, loving and brave ! Let it not be forgotten 
that at this convention a resolution was adopted to give 
to Massachusetts all the aid in their power should Eng- 
land attempt to force that State into submission. 

Among the distinguished men chosen upon this occa- 
sion to act in behalf of the people was Charles Carroll, 
of Carrollton, whose title of Carrollton from the family 
estates in Frederick county, was adopted in contradis- 
tinction to Charles Carroll, barrister. The last-named 
gentlemen was also a native of Annapolis, and said by 
some to be remotely related to the Carrol Is of Carroll- 
ton in the "old land/' He was a gentleman of learn- 
ing, refinement and honorable position, yet not so well 
off in the matter of lands and goods as the subject of 
this sketch. 

On the 12th day of December the Convention ad- 
journed to meet again at the city of Annapolis, on the 
24th of April, 1775. The Revolution, however, broke 
into war before the Convention met. 

On the 28th of June, 1776, the delegates, in behalf of 
the Province, met for the purpose of declaring their 
intention of proclaiming the Colonies free and indepen- 
dent, "reserving to the State complete internal sover- 
eignty" 

Previous to this Mr. Carroll had been sent as a dele- 



88 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

gate to Canada, together with Dr. Benjamin Franklin, 
Samuel Chase, and the Keverend John Carroll. Their 
mission was for the purpose of persuading the Cana- 
dians, if possible, to join the Americans against England. 
From this fruitless mission he had just returned, when 
the great subject of our national independence was being 
discussed. Proceeding immediately to Annapolis he 
argued, with forcible eloquence, the cause for which his 
soul was armed. Greatly owing to his efforts were the 
first steps taken in this important decision on the 28th 
of June. 

On the 4th of July, 1776, Independence was declared 
at the State House, in Philadelphia. Mr. Carroll was 
appointed as delegate to Congress from Maryland, and 
took his seat on the 18th of July, 1776. On the follow- 
ing day the Article was engrossed, and on the 2nd of 
August the members were called upon to sign their 
names. 

Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, assisted in forming the 
Constitution of Maryland in 1776. Mr. Carroll, haying 
retained his seat in the Maryland Convention, was 
chosen as Senator to the First Senate of Maryland, 
under the Constitution in 1776, and in 1777 reappointed 
delegate to Congress. In 1778 he resigned the office, 
but was* re-elected in 1781. During his public career 
his various talents were frequently brought into play, 
and served well the country for whose good he strove 
so nobly. 

Joined to a judgment, clear, calm and generous, his 
profound study and extensive learning served him in 
good part, fie was remarkable for elegance of manner 
— an advantage procured for him through his travels as 
well as familiarity with the best society at home and 
abroad. In writing, as in speaking, his style was full, 
without being diffuse; always logical, marked by ex- 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 8 f J 

treme dignity and sparkling throughout with the orna- 
mental beauties of literature. 

About the year 1784 he took an active part in a con- 
ference " upon the subject of opening and improving 
the navigation of the river Potomac, and concerting a 
plan for opening a proper road between the waters of 
the Potomac and the most convenient Western waters." 
Thus early was introduced the subject of the Chesa- 
peake and Ohio Canal, in which General Washington 
and the Marquis de Lafayette were deeply interested. 

In 1788 he was elected to the Senate of the United 
States, where he served faithfully until 1791. During 
this time he took an active part in the support of the 
Federal party at New York, with Jay and other noted 
men of the period. 

In 1791, he was sent again to the Senate of Maryland, 
where he remained until 1801. 

In the year 1797, he was chosen as one of the Com- 
missioners to settle the disputed boundary line between 
the States of Maryland and Virginia. In 1801, the 
Democratic party having gained the ascendancy, he re- 
tired from public life, being then in the sixty-fourth 
year of his age. A life of excitement and care was ex- 
changed for one of domestic peace. In this sweet tran- 
quility, he was blest by the pure love of his children 
who surrounded him. He was the fortunate possessor 
of great wealth, and in the full possession of his facul- 
ties. Easy and affable in manner, and in conversation 
judicious and elevated, he was usually regarded as the 
leader in whatever circle he found himself; few were 
his superiors, and he won the respect of all classes of 
citizens. While he had struggled manfully in behalf of 
the young Republic, his old political antagonist had 
been wrestling against fate on the opposing side. Daniel 
Pulany, however, had, by the misfortunes of his party. 



90 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

been forced into the quieter walks of life early in the 
day, and when he departed, the glory of a brilliant star 
faded from view. As a power among the intellects of 
Maryland, his name is honored, and his memory cher- 
ished. An ancient lady, whose face brightened at the 
mention of his name, recalled to mind, with reverential 
tone, the great old man " who walked across the hills of 
Maryland, his long camlet cloak fluttering in the breeze, 
his silvery hair hanging about his shoulders, and the 
high oaken staff held as a support in his withered 
hands." Though occupied principally with his family, 
his social cares and joys, after the year 1801, Mr. Carroll 
was still frequently called upon to take part in the affairs 
of general public interest. In the year 1828, he, the 
only signer of the Declaration of Independence living, 
laid the first stone of the Baltimore and Ohio Eailroad. 
With spade in hand, he broke the earth for the great 
iron rails that were in the coming time to bear from 
Maryland, to all portions of the Union, the triumphs of 
enterprise: success, wealth, fame! The inauguration 
of the railroad took place on the 4th of July. Its com- 
mencement was at the western limit of the city of Bal- 
timore. 

The North American Eeview of 1829 contains the 
following with regard to this giant work of civilization : 

" The general direction of the route of the railway, 
as thus described, is, from Baltimore to the * Point of 
Kocks,' a little south of west; thence to Hancock, ap- 
proaching northwest. From Hancock to Cumberland, 
the general direction is very little south of west, though 
there is a great circuit in consequence of the direction 
of the river. Beyond Cumberland, by way of the Cheat, 
to the western base of the Laurel Kidge, the course, 
though winding, is included between southwest and 
west. Thence to the Ohio, the direction is nearly west. 



CHARLES CARROLL, OP CARROLLTON. 91 

Should the route by Casselman's river and the Yough- 
agany be adopted, the general direction from Cumber- 
land to the mouth of Casselman's river, and thence by 
the Youghagany to Pittsburg, would be northwest. 

" From this necessarily brief description of the three 
regions through which the railroad is to pass, our read- 
ers will have perceived, however, that in its whole extent, 
its practicableness is beyond doubt. In the western 
division, extending from the base of the Laurel Hill to 
the Ohio, there is, on any of the routes, so little serious 
difficulty to be apprehended, that the ground, on the 
contrary, is in a high degree favorable. The character 
of the Allegany, and the other ridges forming with it 
the height of land between the eastern and western 
waters, is certainly very different. But of the two 
principal routes across it, one is by no means impractica- 
ble ; the other is expected to afford much greater advan- 
tages. Of the eastern division, the examinations are 
already so accurate as to evince the perfect facility of its 
construction. We shall here add some particulars of 
this last section of the route, embraced between Cum- 
berland and Baltimore, as it has received a more minute 
examination than the others, and as an actual com- 
mencement has been made on a part of it, the twenty- 
four miles between Baltimore and the fork of the 
Patapsco above Ellicott's Mills." 

And from the same interesting pages we read : 
" The contractors have commenced work on the sec- 
tion between Baltimore and Ellicott's Mills, and are 
rapidly advancing. A part is already finished for the 
reception of the rails, and there is every reason to expect 
that the graduation and masonry of the whole of it, 
together with some farther portions, will be completed 
by the first of June next. The contracts, notwithstand- 
ing the shortness of the notice, were readily taken, at 



92 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

fair prices ; and the improvements already introduced in 
the performance of the work, snch as temporary railways 
for the removal of the earth, with others, will not only 
reduce the cost to the contractors, but will be beneficially 
felt in future contracts. Meanwhile, surveys are in pro- 
gress, in order to a final location of the road. These 
have already been made on the principal points, as far 
up the valley of the Potomac as Cumberland. 

" The localities, through which the above surveys have 
been conducted, are found, so far as the surveys are 
complete, highly favorable to the structure of the road. 
The natural surface in the immediate vicinity of the 
route, is generally firm, and well adapted to its support. 
Quicksands never occur; the hills are never so abrupt 
as to require tunneling; and though the course of the 
road, in order to preserve a level, is necessarily serpen- 
tine, the distance on the most favorable routes is far less 
augmented than might be supposed. Cliffs and preci- 
pices sometimes present themselves ; but none of such 
extent or difficulty as not to be overcome at an expense 
comparatively moderate. The necessary timber is found 
in most parts beyond the immediate vicinity of Balti- 
more; but locust, though it abounds in some places, is 
not generally near at hand. The valley of the Potomac, 
frequently bounded indeed by rugged precipices, passa- 
ble only by means of artificial roadways, cut into the 
cliffs, or supported by walls reared from the bed of the 
river, is for the most part, nevertheless, easy of passage. 
The rocky debris at the base of the river hills not only 
afford a foundation, but supply the materials for con- 
structing the bed of the road at a cheap rate, as also for 
the numerous small bridges and culverts that will be 
required. Good building stone is found almost univer- 
sally. Stone rails can be delivered on the route at the 
moderate price of eight cents the running foot ; locust 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 93 

sleepers for the same purpose, at twenty-five cents 
each." 

In January, 1829, the stock of the company was four 
millions of dollars, of which the State of Maryland and 
the Corporation of Baltimore held each half a million. 
Philip E. Thomas, Esq., of Baltimore, was the President 
of the road. Their board of Engineers consisted of Col- 
onel Long, J. Knight, Esq., and Captain McNeill. Dr. 
Howard, of the United States' Engineers, was engaged 
in the reconnaissance and preliminary surveys on which 
the first report of the Engineers is founded ; and the 
Engineer Department liberally gave the assistance of a 
number of the officers of the army. The Superintendent 
was Casper Weaver, Esq. 

And thus was introduced to our State this Alpha and 
Omega of Maryland inland trade and commerce, whose 
capital stock in 1875 is $16,815,362; Assets, $78,975,- 
807.95 ; whose President is John W. Garrett. July the 
4th, 1828, was a gala day in the city of Baltimore. The 
venerable Charles Carroll, accompanied by other men of 
distinction, appeared in the line of procession that moved 
through the principal streets toward the important 
point. All the trades were represented distinctly; gar- 
deners, Baltimore county farmers, etc. The ship-car- 
penters were represented by " a frigate of the first-class, 
fifteen feet long and of proportionable dimensions in 
every other respect. The stern was beautifully orna- 
mented with carved work, representing the American 
Eagle in wreaths of oak leaves." The Carrollton March 
was played by the band upon the field, after which the 
public gathering was addressed by Mr. Morris. On the 
summit of a hill forming one of a line,, a handsome can- 
opy was erected, for the reception of Mr. Carroll, the 
Railroad Directors, the Mayor of Baltimore, and other 
civil authorities, as well as many invited guests. Along 
8 



94 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

the range of hills extended a line of cavalry, commanded 
by Captain Kennedy. Mr. Carroll came upon the ground 
in an open barouche, drawn by four horses, attended by 
postilions, dressed in blue and white, and wearing tur- 
ban hats. 

The descriptions in the newspapers of the day are very 
interesting. Those who opposed the railroad system 
were as loud in their outcry as those who desired its 
success. 

On the same day chosen for inaugurating the Balti- 
more and Ohio Eailroad, ground was broken for the 
Ohio and Chesapeake Canal, July the 4th, 1828. The 
President of the United States, who was present, after 
performing his portion of the ceremony, handed the 
spade to General Mercer. The day was cloudless, and 
considered by those who looked on the bright side of 
the picture, as an auspicious sign, fifty-two years after 
the Declaration of Independence. 

Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, had two daughters and 
one son. Miss Catharine Carroll became the wife of 
Robert Goodloe Harper, the distinguished Virginia 
soldier-lawyer, who was a patriot and a philanthropist. 
The eldest daughter married an English gentleman 
named Richard Caton. The only son, Mr. Charles 
Carroll, first loved and " courted " Miss Nelly Custis, 
who preferred the name of Lewis to that of Carroll. 
After this the young heir discovered his destined wife 
in the city of Philadelphia. The young lady in ques- 
tion was Miss Harriet Chew, the sister of the wife of 
Colonel John Eager Howard. The family of Miss 
Chew were Episcopalians, and insisted that the mar- 
riage should be performed according to the ritual of the 
Church of England, by the venerable Bishop White. 
Mr. Carroll was finally induced to accede to the wishes 
of the family. The preparations completed, the cere- 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 95 

mony was to take place in a few moments, when Mrs. 
Caton arrived, accompanied by Arcbhishop Carroll, of 
Baltimore. After a few moments conversation with his 
sister, Mr. Carroll changed the order of approaching 
events by deciding in favor of the faith of his fathers, 
and Bishop Carroll performed the marriage ceremony 
according to the Roman ritual, after which Bishop 
White performed the service of the Church of England. 

The daughters of Mr. Richard Caton, four noted 
beauties, made what are termed brilliant matches. 
Mary Anne married Robert Patterson, the brother-in- 
law of Jerome Bonaparte. This lady afterward becom- 
ing a widow, visited England for her health, and soon 
became the wife of the Marquis of Wellesly, the 
brother of the Duke of Wellington, and at that time 
the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. Her portrait was 
painted by Sir Thomas Lawrence. So noted was she 
for her beauty and accomplishments that the late 
Bishop England in " toasting " the last survivor of the 
Declaration of Independence, offered the following 
tribute : " Charles Carroll, of Carrollton — in the land 
from which his father fled in fear, his daughter's 
daughter reigns a queen." 

Louisa Catharine Caton married Sir Harvey Felton, 
Aid-de-camp to the Duke of Wellington; upon his 
death she married the eldest son, the Marquis of Car- 
marthen, who afterward succeeded to his father's title 
Elizabeth J. Caton married Baron Stafford, the de- 
scendant of that Stafford who was beheaded in the reign 
of Charles II, of England, for his supposed favor to the 
"Popish plot" 

Emily Caton became the wife of John McTavish, a 
Scotch gentleman living at that time in Canada. 

On Wednesday, the 14th of November, 1832, in the 
96th year of his age, Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, 



96 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

passed away from the earth. He died at the house of 
his daughter in Pratt street, Baltimore, in that portion 
of the city now known as Old Town. 

The following poetical tribute to " The Last of the 
Signers," by Lippard, is worthy of being read and re- 
membered : 

" One by one, the pillars have crumbled from the roof 
of the temple, and now the last — a trembling column — 
glows in the sunlight, as it is about to fall. 

" But for the pillar that crumbles, there is no hope that 
it shall ever tower aloft in its pride again, while for this 
old man, about to sink into the night of the grave, there 
is a glorious hope. His memory will live. His eoul 
will live, not only in the presence of its God, but on the 
tongues, and in the hearts of millions. The band in 
which he counts one, can never be forgotten. 

"The last! As the venerable man stands before us, 
the declining day imparts a warm flush to his face, and 
surrounds his brow with a halo of light. His lips move 
without a sound : he is recalling the scenes of the Dec- 
laration — he is murmuring the names of his brothers in 
the good work. 

"All gone but him! Upon the woods— dyed with 
the rainbow of the closing year — upon the stream, dark- 
ened by masses of shadow — upon the home peeping out 
from among the leaves, falls mellowing the last light of 
the declining day. 

" He will never see the sun rise again ! He feels that 
the silver cord is slowly, gently loosening; he knows 
the golden bowl is crumbling at the fountain's brink. 
But death comes on him as a sleep, as a pleasant dream, 
as a kiss from beloved lips ! 

" He feels that the land of his birth has become a 
mighty people, and thanks God that he was permitted 
to behold its blossoms of hope ripen into full life. 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 97 

" In the recess near the window, you behold an altar of 
prayer ; above it, glowing in the fading light, the image 
of Jesus seems smiling, even in agony, around that 
death-chamber. 

" The old man turns aside from the, window. Totter- 
ing on, he kneels beside the altar, his long dark robe 
drooping over the floor. He reaches forth his white 
hands — he raises his eyes to the face of the Crucified. 

" There, in the sanctity of an old man's last prayer, we 
will leave him. There, where amid the deepening shad- 
ows, glows the image of the Saviour ; there, where the 
light falls over the mild face, the wavy hair and tranquil 
eyes of the aged patriarch. 

"The smile of the Saviour was upon that perilous 
day, the 4th of July, 1776 ; and now that its promise 
has brightened into fruition, He seems to — He does 
smile on it again — even as His sculptured image meets 
the dying gaze of Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, the 

LAST OF THE SIGNERS." 

Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, a Catholic by reason of 
faith as well as inheritance, had learned w r ell the first 
great lesson of the mother church : " That obedience is 
better than sacrifice." In the maturer years of his life? 
he practiced most rigidly the penance of abstinence on 
those days set apart by the church as fasting days. He 
was so faithful in assisting at the divine office, that it 
was his great pleasure to ^erve the priest during the 
offering of the holy Mass. In the monthly visits of the 
missionary priest, Mr. Carroll was the first person on 
his knees in the confessional. He was a monthly com- 
municant for many years before his death; and so ear- 
nest was his desire to repair any wrong impressions 
caused in earlier days, that he selected the High Mass 
at eleven o'clock on Easter Sunday to receive commun- 
ion, and this was his coming back to those neglected 



98 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

duties over which his heart had not ceased to mourn, 
and for which he was bound, as Catholics ever are, to 
make reparation. In the chapel adjoining his residence 
at the Manor, he spent many precious hours. This was 
the first place he sought in the morning, where a half 
hour was spent in prayer and meditation. The morn- 
ings were usually passed until one o'clock, P. M., in the 
cultivation of literature. He wrote Latin with facility, 
and no day was allowed to pass without the perusal of 
the works of some of the ancient authors ; yet as age 
deepened upon him his reading was confined principally 
to books of a religious character, and their effect, and 
his sentiments, were constantly revealed in the purity 
and holiness that prevailed in his conversation. 

His body reposes in the Church at Doughoragan 
Manor. On the Gospel side of the altar is a monument, 
erected by order of the late Colonel Charles Carroll, 
which was executed by the American artist, Bartholo- 
mew, in Rome, 1853. According to the father of Mr. 
John Lee Carroll, the house at Doughoragan Manor 
was built about the year 1717. The men employed in 
its erection were brought from England for that purpose, 
and returned home after the completion of the building. 

It is a handsome old-style residence, with a chapel 
attached, which is connected by a private entrance with 
the house. The grounds are well kept and extensive, 
and many an ancient tree, shadowing the sward, bears 
evidence of " the days that are no more." To use the 
words of Bishop Pinkney, of Maryland: 

" No living man bad seen it in the bud, 
And none could tell the day it first took root; 
While on its brave old trunk a hundred names 
Were deep engraven. The hands that wrote them 
Are stiff and cold ; but still the names remain, 
As fresh as when they were at first engraved, 
And will remain for ages." 



OF CAKROLLTON. 99 

The land on which stand the buildings of Saint 
Charles College, in Howard county, Maryland, was pre- 
sented by Mr. Carroll, January the 21st, 1830. His 
wishes in regard to the purposes of the establishment 
have been fulfilled thus far. It is a preparatory seminary, 
under the direction of the order of Saint Sulpice, for the 
education of youth destined for the priesthood. The col- 
lege farm was a portion of land originally known as 
" Mary's Lot," which had been added by Mr. Carroll to 
Doughoragan Manor by purchase. The transfer could, 
therefore, be made without injury or injustice to his 
heirs. The corner-stone of the building was blessed by 
Archbishop Whitfield; it was then laid by Mr. Carroll, 
July the 11th, 1831. 

Mr. Carroll was the inheritor of vast tracts of land 
throughout his native State. Of Carrollton Manor, the 
following is written of the grant which was obtained 
from "Charles, Lord Baltimore, a grant of 10,000 acres 
of land in Frederick county, with liberty to select the 
best land they could find ; they first fixed on a spot be- 
yond Frederick town, but finding the land better on 
this side of Frederick, changed to the spot which the 
present Mr. Carroll now possesses on the Monocacy 
river." It is said that the first view ever obtained of 
these beautiful lands, by the ancestor of Mr. Carroll, 
was enjoyed from the summit of the Sugar Loaf Moun- 
tain, a spur of the Blue Ridge. And now, adding to 
his already full wreath, is presented this golden leaf 
from the Reminiscences of Macready: 

"We received attentions from many families, among 
the rest from that of Dr Potter, my physician, a very 
skillful, intelligent and agreeable man, who accompanied 
me in a visit which I paid, on his own particular invi- 
tation, to Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, a man most 
interesting from his varied and extensive acquirements, 



100 CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 

and, especially, as being the last surviving signer of the 
Declaration of Independence. He was a rare instance 
of extreme old age (being then in his ninetieth year), 
retaining all the vivacity and grace of youth with the 
polish of one educated in the school of Chesterfield. In 
my life's experience, I have never met with a more fin- 
ished gentleman. At his advanced age he kept up his 
acquaintance with the classics. He spoke of England 
with respect, and of his own country, its institutions, 
its prospects, and its dangers, with perfect freedom, an- 
ticipating its eventual greatness, if not marred by faction 
and the vice of intemperance in the use of ardent 
spirits, detaining me, not unwillingly, more than two 
hours in most attractive conversation. When, at last, I 
was obliged to take my leave, he rose, and, to my en- 
treaty that he would not attempt to follow me down 
stairs, he replied in the liveliest manner, " Oh, I shall 
never see you again, and so I will see the last of you !"' 
He shook hands with me at the street door, and I bade 
a reluctant adieu to one of the noblest samples of man- 
hood 1 had ever seen, or am ever likely to look upon.'' — 
Macreadifs Reminiscences, Vol. I, p. 322; London, 1875. 

The following extract is from one of the newspapers 
of the day, (1875) : 

"In the year 1826, after all save one of the band of 
patriots whose signatures are borne on the Declaration 
of Independence had descended to the tomb, and the 
venerable Carroll alone remained among the living, the 
government of the city of New York deputed a com- 
mittee to wait on the illustrious survivor and obtain 
from him, for deposit in the public hall of the city, a 
copy of the Declaration of 1776, graced and authenti- 
cated anew with his sign manual. The aged patriot 
yielded to the request, and affixed with his own hand to 
the copy of that instrument the grateful, solemn and 
pious supplemental declaration which follows: 



CHARLES CARROLL, OF CARROLLTON. 101 

" Grateful to Almighty God for the blessings which, 
through Jesus Christ our Lord, He has conferred on my 
beloved country in her emancipation, and on myself in 
permitting me, under circumstances of mercy, to live to 
the age of eighty-nine years, and to survive the fiftieth 
year of American independence, and certify by my 
present signature my approbation of the Declaration of 
Independence adopted by Congress on the 4th of July, 
1776, which I originally subscribed on the 2nd day of 
August of the same year, and of which I am now the 
last surviving signer, I do hereby recommend to the 
present and future generations the principles of that im- 
portant document as the best earthly inheritance their 
ancestors could bequeath to them, and pray that the 
civil and religious liberties they have secured to my 
country may be perpetuated to remotest posterity, and 
extended to the whole family of man. 

Charles Carroll, of Carrollton." 

"August 2, 1826." 





(mC5 



EVENING HYMN. 



THE evening stillness sweetly steals 
O'er earth and air; 
The Vesper ehimes, in solemn peals, 

The hour of prayer; 
While with rapt hearts and bended knee, 
We chant our evening hymn to thee, 
Virgin Bless'd, to thee ! 

The birds with music sweet, no more 

The forest fill; 
The melody of day is o'er. 

All, all is still ; 
Save that in holy harmony, 
We chant our evening hymn to thee, 

Virgin Bless'd, to thee! 

Virgin Mother, linger near, 

Our prayers approve, 

And upward to our Father bear 
Our words of love, 

While robed in faith our souls agree 

To chant our evening hymn to thee, 
Virgin Bless'd, to thee! 



George Hay Ringgold, 

United States Army. 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL, 
First Archbishop of Baltimore. 




MONG the dauntless soldiers of Maryland was 
one who wore an invisible armor. This was 
John Carroll, the hero of a thousand victories. 
Marking his triumphal way, imperishable 
monuments have arisen to immortalize his fame. His 
fame is linked with the name of the Great Captain 
whose work he did most faithfully. The name of his 
Captain is the watch-word of Eternity. It is em- 
blazoned upon the ramparts of Time, unchanging as 
the rock-bound "inviolet hills." It will resound 
through the far realms of the Everlasting, when the 
ages are no more. 

John Carroll was the third son of Daniel Carroll, of 
Ireland, who in his youth had emigrated to the Colony 
of Maryland. Belonging to a Roman Catholic family 
of the " mother-land," he had forfeited his rights as a 
property-holder because of his faith. Daniel Carroll 
established himself as a merchant at Upper Marl- 
borough, on the Patuxent river, in Maryland. He 
married Miss Eleanor Darnall, the daughter of Mr. 
Darnall, a gentleman of wealth, who was, like Mr. 
Carroll, also a Roman Catholic. Miss Darnall, who 
had been educated in. France, was not alone cultured 
and refined in manner and intellect to the exclusion of 



104 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

her heart; she was noted for those virtues that en- 
noble and purify the life of woman, and render home 
beautiful in its peace. She was the mother of John 
Carroll, who was born at Upper Marlborough, in Mary- 
land, on the 8th day of January, 1735. This day 
noted in American history for the gaining of a victory 
by the force of arms deserves to be doubly celebrated as 
the birth-day of the great and good Bishop, whose tri- 
umphs were achieved through the power of Christianity. 
He was the instrument selected by the Divine Will to 
accomplish a high and holy mission. Urged onward 
by a sublime inspiration only comprehended by those 
upon whom Heaven bestows its best gifts, he fulfilled 
most perfectly the commands of his Koyal Guide. 

At the age of twelve he was placed at a grammar 
school established at Bohemia. This place, situated 
upon what was known as a manor in the early days of 
Terre Maria, claims an important notice in our history. 
The founder of this manor was that remarkable man, 
Augustine Herman, whose story is so strangely inter- 
woven with that of the Lord Proprietary of Maryland. 

After a time John Carroll was sent to the College of 
Saint Omer, in French Flanders. This institution was 
under the direction of the Jesuits. It was also the 
place of learning selected for the early training of 
his relative Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, who was for 
a time his schoolmate. At the termination of six years 
John Carroll finished the usual college course ; he was 
then placed at a college at Liege, which was also under 
the direction of the Jesuits. While at this institution 
he formed the resolution of pursuing a course of the- 
ology preparatory to entering the order known as the 
Society of Jesus. This order, founded by Saint Ignatius, 
of Loyola, is honored for its noble works of charity as 
well as for the profound learning of many of its mem- 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 105 

bers. Having fulfilled the term of a novice, John 
Carroll was ordained as a priest in 1769, and in 1771 
he was professed. 

Before renouncing the world he settled the estate, 
which he had inherited from his father, upon his 
brother, Daniel Carroll, Esq., and his two younger 
sisters. 

Father John Carroll was now sent to Saint Omer's 
college, where he held the place of professor in that 
institution. Eeturning in a short time to Liege, he 
directed the students of the higher classics. He was 
thus employed when the order for the supression of the 
Society of Jesus was executed, in 1773. When the 
Jesuits were driven from their domains in Trance, the 
colleges of Saint Omer and Liege were closed. The 
young Jesuit, Father John Carroll, on the 11th of 
September, 1773, wrote the following letter from 
Bruges, which is extracted, with much of the material 
for this sketch, from Mr. Brent's life of Bishop Carroll : 

" I this day received a few lines from Daniel, of July 
15th, in which he complains with much reason of my 
long silence. My mind is at present too full of other 
things to make any apology. After spending part of 
the autumn of 1772 at Naples, and its environs, we 
returned to pass the winter at Kome, where I stayed 
till near the end of March ; from thence came to Flor- 
ence, Geneva, Tunis, Lyons, Paris, and so to Liege and 
Bruges. I was willing to accept of the vacant post of 
Prefect of the Sodality here, after consigning Mr. 
Stourton into his Father's hands about two months ago, 
that I might enjoy some retirement, and consider well 
in the presence of God the disposition I found myself 
in of going to join my relatives in Maryland, and in 
case that disposition continued, to get out next Spring; 
but now all room for deliberation seems over. The 
9 



106 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

enemies of the Society, and above all the unrelenting 
perseverance of the Spanish and Portuguese Ministries, 
with the passiveness of the Court of Vienna, have at 
length obtained their ends, and our so long persecuted, 
and I must add, holy Society, is no more. God's holy 
will be done, and may His name be blessed for ever and 
ever! This fatal stroke was struck on the 21st of July, 
but was kept secret at Rome till the 16th of August, 
and was only made known to us on the 5th of Septem- 
ber. I am not, and perhaps never shall be, recovered 
from the shock of this dreadful intelligence. The 
greatest blessing which, in my estimation, 1 could re- 
ceive from God, would be immediate death ; but if He 
deny me this, may His holy and adorable designs on me 
be wholly fulfilled. Is it possible that Divine Provi- 
dence should permit to such an end, a body wholly 
devoted, and I will still aver, with the most disinter- 
ested charity, in procuring every comfort and advantage 
to their neighbors, whether by preaching, teaching, 
catechizing, missions, visiting hospitals, prisons, and 
every other function of spiritual and corporal mercy ? 
Such I have beheld it in every part of my travels, the 
first of all ecclesiastical bodies in the esteem and con- 
fidence of the faithful, and certainly the most laborious. 
"What will become of our flourishing congregations with 
you, and those cultivated by the German Fathers ? 
These reflections crowd so fast upon me that I almost 
lo3e my senses ; but I will endeavor to suppress them 
for a few moments. You see that I am now my own 
master, and left to my own direction. In returning to 
Maryland I shall have the comfort of not only being 
with you, but of being farther out of the reach of 
scandal and defamation, and removed from the scenes 
of distress of many of my dearest friends, whom God 
knows, I shall not be able to relieve. I shall, therefore, 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 1U7 

most certainly sail for Maryland early next Spring, if 
I possibly can." 

When the suppression of the Jesuit order was finally 
effected, he retired to England. For a while he actet\ 
as Secretary to those members of the Society born in 
the British dominions, who addressed a petition of re- 
monstrance to the government of France regarding the 
seizure of their property. At this period Father Car- 
roll was induced by Lord Stourton, a Soman Catholic 
nobleman, to make the tour of the continent of Europe 
in the capacity of preceptor to his son, the Honorable 
Mr. Stourton. During this tour he wrote for his pupil 
a brief history of England. To the termination of this 
tour he alludes in the letter presented above. 

Upon his arrival in England he was invited by Lord 
Arundel to reside in his family, asking that his friend 
would act as chaplain to his household. This invita- 
tion he graciously accepted, and was thus enabled to 
bestow the comfort of religions assurances upon the 
catholic family of Wardour House. Wardonr Castle, 
whose ruins are near by, is conspicuous in history as 
having been defended against assault during five days, 
by a garrison of twenty-five men under the command of 
the Lady Blanche Arundel. The attack was made dur- 
ing a brief absence of her husband ; the fair lady was 
finally compelled to surrender on honorable terms. 
Upon the return of her husband, Lord Thomas 
Arundel, he caused a mine to be sprung under the 
castle, which was thereby reduced to a state of ruin in 
1643. The more modern building, known as Wardour 
House, is a handsome mansion situated in the midst of 
a grove. Among numerous pictures and relics of the 
days of old, there is said to be a fine portrait of the 
Lady Blanche Arundel. Near the altar of the beauti- 
ful chapel is a monument erected in memory of Thomas, 
second Lord Arundel, and his heroic wife. 



108 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

Father John Carroll remained much longer than had 
been his expectation in England. He had vainly hoped 
to behold the re-establishment of the Jesuit order in 
the catholic States of Europe. Being disappointed in 
this hope, he embarked in one of the last vessels that 
sailed from England for America. Arriving in his 
native land just before the outbreak of the Revolution- 
ary war, he landed at Richland, in Virginia, the estate 
of William Brent, Esq., who had married the second 
sister of Father Carroll. 

He spent two days in the society of his sisters in Vir- 
ginia, both of whom were married to gentlemen of the 
same sirname, William and Robert Brent. His widowed 
mother resided with her two younger daughters in 
Montgomery county, Md. Toward them he hastened 
with love and respect. Duty, to whose call he was ever 
attentive, left him little time for the endearing associa- 
tions of home. Gathering together the. Catholics of 
Montgomery, he formed them into congregations, ex- 
pending much labor and care in their instruction. 
Daring this time he also extended his devoted zeal to 
the ministration of the Catholics in the neighborhood 
of his sisters' home at Aquia Creek, Stafford county, in 
the State of Virginia. Although desiring to extend the 
faith practically in all places, his heart went out natu- 
rally to those of his own blood first ; these were the 
descendants of those men and women who had suffered 
persecution, renounced worldly honors, and titles, and 
goods, in behalf of religion. There was at this time no 
Catholic church built in Virginia. Mass was celebrated 
at the house of Mr. Brent; those of this faith who had 
banded themselves together as a congregation, would, 
upon the coming of a priest from Maryland, receive the 
sacrament, and listen to instructions from the servant 
of the Church. 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 109 

He built the chapel of Saint John's, in Montgomery 
county, Maryland, a portion of which still stands as an 
evidence of his early labors. The rear of the building is 
the only portion standing from early days. Yet, not- 
withstanding the modern additions and repairs, the 
names and associations clustering about this sacred edi- 
fice render it dear to the Maryland heart. Ranked 
around the walls of this ancient chapel, like sentinels, 
lie those " who have gone before in the sign of peace." 
Among other graves is that of Bishop Carroll's mother. 
Upon the old tombstone is the following inscription : 
" Eleanor Carroll, relict of Daniel Carroll, died 3d of 
February, 1796, aged 92." His father is also said to be 
buried in the same place, with others of the Carroll 
family. 

Although the works of Father John Carroll had made 
his name as a shining light amongst his fellow-men, yet 
in his great wisdom his heart remained always humble. 
He was not, however, destined to continue in the more 
secluded walks of Life. In the year 1789, a general 
meeting of the Roman Catholic clergy of the United 
States was held in Baltimore city, at which it was de- 
cided to petition the Roman Pontiff to appoint a Bishop 
to the See in Baltimore. The Reverend John Carroll 
was unanimously named as the candidate to the high 
office. The following letters, published in Mr. Brent's 
" Life of Bishop Carroll," relate to the selection and 
election of a Bishop to the Baltimore See : 

In 1789 Father John Carroll writes to his friend, the 
Reverend Charles Plowden : 

" I received, only about the middle of last month, 
Cardinal Antonelli's letter, dated in July last, by which 
he informs me that his holiness has granted our request 
for an ordinary bishop, the See to be fixed by ourselves, 
and the choice to be made by the officiating clergymen. 
9* 



110 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

The matter will be gone on immediately, and God, I 
trust, will direct to a good choice. This confidence is 
my comfort ; otherwise I should be full of apprehensions 
of the choice falling where it would be fatal indeed." 

Very fully was his desire realized, yet not perhaps 
according to his expectations. In the spring of the 
same year he wrote as follows : 

" Communicating freely with you, as I do, you would 
not forgive me, were I to omit informing you that a 
grant had been made to all our officiating clergy to 
choose one of their body as bishop ; and it is left to our 
determination whether he shall be an ordinary, taking 
his title from some town of our appointment, or a titular 
bishop, by which, I understand, a bishop constituted 
over a country, without the designation of any particu- 
lar see. Our brethren chose to have an ordinary bishop, 
and named Baltimore to be the bishop's title, this being 
the principal town of Maryland, and that State being 
the oldest and still the most numerous residence of our 
religion in America, So far all was right. We then 
proceeded to the election, the event of which was such 
as deprives me of all expectation of rest or pleasure 
henceforward, and fills me with terror, with respect to 
eternity. I am so stunned with the issue of this busi- 
ness, that I truly hate the hearing or mention of it, and 
therefore will say only, that since my brethren, whom 
in this case I consider as the interpreters of the Divine 
Will, say I must obey, I will even do it, if, by obeying, I 
shall sacrifice henceforth every moment of peace and 
satisfaction. I most earnestly commend myself to your 
prayers and those of my other friends." 

In 1790 Father Carroll won't to England to be conse- 
crated as " Bishop of Baltimore." In reply to an invi- 
tation from his friend, Thomas Weld, Esq., of England, 
to be consecrated at his residence, he writes : " I cannot 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. Ill 

sufficiently acknowledge the most obliging and honora- 
ble testimony of Mr. Weld's regard ; you will be pleased 
to express, with all that warmth which you can com- 
municate to your expressions, my deep sense of his gen- 
erous politeness. 

" My inclination certainly leads me to accept of an offer 
not only so flattering, but which will afford me an op- 
portunity of seeing some of those friends whom I shall 
ever honor and love. But I cannot yet determine what 
I shall do. I still flatter myself that Divine Providence 
will provide some worthier subject to be its instrument 
in founding a church in America." 

Divine Providence did select its most worthy subject 
to found the Church in America, and in the summer of 
that year Father Carroll sailed for the shores of the old 
world. He was consecrated on Sunday, the 15th day of 
August, the Feast of the Assumption of the Mother of 
God, in the Chapel of Lul worth Castle. The act of 
consecration was performed during the ceremony of 
High Mass, by the Eight Reverend Charles Walmsley, 
Bishop of Rama, Senior Vicar Apostolic of the Catholic 
Church in the Kingdom of Great Britain. An eloquent 
address was delivered by Father Charles Plowden, of 
the Society of Jesus. Mr. Brent says, in writing of 
Mr. Weld on this occasion : " The munificence of that 
gentleman omitted no circumstance which could possi- 
bly add dignity to so venerable a ceremony. The two 
prelates were attended by +heir respective assistant 
priest and acolytes, according to the rubric of the Roman 
pontifical. The richness of their vestments, the music 
of the choir, the multitude of the wax-lights, and the 
ornaments of the altar, concurred to increase the splen- 
dor of the solemnity, which made a lasting impression 
upon every beholder." 

Lulworth is a castle on the coast of Dorsetshire, and 



112 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

is supposed to be built on the site of a castle mentioned 
by historians as standing in 1146. It is built princi- 
pally from material taken from the ruins of Bindon 
Abbey. The foundation was laid in 1588, and the 
building was completed in 1641, at which time it was 
purchased by the family of Weld. The east front is 
laced with Ohilmark stone, and the landing-place was 
named the Cloisters, because it was paved with the 
stones from the cloisters of Bindon Abbey. The chapel 
is a short distance from the castle, and was erected by 
Mr. Weld, who was afterward created a Cardinal. It 
is built in the form of a circle, " increased by four sec- 
tions of a circle so as to form a cross ;" it is dedicated 
to the Virgin Mother of God. The account given by 
that recorder of beautiful antiquities, John Timbs, is 
full of interest regarding the castle and its owners. 

On the 13th of September, 1790, Bishop Carroll wrote 
from London to a friend, in reply to an invitation to re- 
visit the home of Mr. Weld : 

" I am sorry, very sorry indeed, to inform you that I 
cannot, without the greatest inconvenience, revisit Lul- 
worth, and present once more my respectful thanks to 
the worthy master and mistress of the castle. I have 
balanced long in my mind, the opposite considerations 
of further sojournment in England, and immediate re- 
turn to America; and I think, after all deliberation, 
that my duty calls me to return immediately to my 
diocese, and give the example of residence in it; for, in 
general, bishops are so ready to admit pretexts for ex- 
empting themselves from that obligation, that I think 
myself bound to give them no encouragement by my 

example, even on a plausible pretense 

I cannot resolve on this without great pain of mind. 
•. . . Long shall I retain the im- 
pression made on me at Lulworth Castle by the good- 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 113 

ness, the charity, the loveliness of every branch of that 
most respectable family ; and I am sure my heart will 
be full of the gratefullest emotions when I shall sail 
abreast of the castle. They will accompany me to 
America, and will be soothed, though revived afresh, 
whenever I shall have the comfort of a letter from you." 

In October of 1790, he sailed from Gravesend, arriving 
at Baltimore on the 7th of December. Bishop Madison, 
of Virginia, who had accompanied him on the voyage 
to England, for the purpose of being consecrated bishop 
of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Old Dominion, 
returned with him to America. They long continued 
in friendly intercourse after this companionship upon 
the rough waves of the Atlantic. 

Bishop Carroll thus writes to a friend in England, 
after arriving in America : 

" At my arrival, as my friends in Baltimore got notice 
of the ship being in the bay, I was met by a large body 
of Catholics and others at the landing and conducted to 
our house. On the following Sunday you may believe 
the concourse of all sorts of people to our church was 
very great, though the day proved unfavorable. Five of 
my brethren were with me. They, with the trustees or 
wardens of the church, received me, vested in my ponti- 
ficals, at the door, and walked into the church proces- 
sionally ; after the Asperges, and whilst the Te Deum 
was singing, I was conducted to the foot of the altar, 
and, after it was finished, to the pontifical seat or 
throne, where I received the obeisance of the clergy and 
some of the laity, in behalf of the rest, they approaching 
to kiss the episcopal ring." " After remaining a few 
days in Baltimore," continues Mr. Brent, " he hastened 
to the residence of his mother, to testify toward her 
those sentiments of love and veneration which charac- 
terized so strongly his intercourse with her." 



114 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL, 

Through the instrumentality of Bishop Carroll, whilst 
in England, arrangements were entered into with the 
Eeverend Mr. Nagot, a director of the Ecclesiastic Sem- 
inary of St. Sulpice, in Paris, for establishing a similar 
institution in this country. The political troubles of 
France haying arrived at a most unhappy state about 
this period, the Sulpicians were forced to withdraw from 
that country, which, through the assistance of the United 
States Minister, Gouverncur Morris, Esq., they accom- 
plished in peace. They were allowed to transfer a por- 
tion of their funds and property to America. Purchas- 
ing a house and several acres of land near the city of 
Baltimore, the Sulpicians in 1791, under the immediate 
direction of Monsieur Nagot, their former director, 
established a seminary, which was elevated to the dig- 
nity of a university by an Act of the Maryland Legisla- 
ture, in January, 1805. 

Bishop Carroll, taking an extended view of intellectual 
culture as well as that pertaining to the soul, gave every 
aid in his power toward the advancement of education 
throughout the country. Through his zeal, which is 
well worthy of imitation, he opened many a passage to 
the wonderful fountains of knowledge. 

In writing to the editors of the Columbian Magazine, 
he said: "I purchase and read your magazine, when 
convenient, because I wish well to every undertaking 
for the advancement of useful knowledge amongst my 
countrymen. But I am sorry to find that some of your 
correspondents endeavor to render your work the vehicle 
of disingenuity, and to taint it with the poison of reli- 
gious rancor. They care not, it seems, how much they 
misrepresent facts and doctrines, provided they can 
bring disrepute on the party, which they have devoted 

to contempt One of them 

sends you a fabricated history of Cardinal Tusloue, who 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 115 

never existed, and which you inserted in a former mag- 
azine; this history he enriched with inflammatory com- 
ments; but he had neither justice nor candour enough 
to undeceive your readers by informing them that the 
whole was a malicious fable. I must waive ceremony 
so far, as to remind you, that you come in yourself for a 
share of this blame. For having published so false a 
relation, it became you to correct your mistake, after 
you found that it was contradicted in the foreign prints, 
which suggested the first lines of invention to your im- 
proving correspondent 

Thanks to the genuine spirit of Christianity, the United 
States have banished intolerance from their systems of 
government, and many of them have done the justice to 
every denomination of Christians, which ought to be 
done to them in all, of placing them on the same foot- 
ing of citizenship, and conferring an equal right of par- 
ticipation in national privileges. Freedom and indepen - 
dence, acquired by the united efforts, and cemented 
with the mingled blood of Protestant and Catholic 
fellow-citizens, should be eqnally enjoyed by all. The 
Jersey State was the first which, in forming her new 
constitution, gave the unjust example of reserving to 
Protestants alone the prerogatives of government and 
legislation. At that very time the American army 
swarmed with Roman Catholic soldiers, and the world 
would have held them justified had they withdrawn 
themselves from the defence of a State which treated 
them with so much cruelty and injustice, and which 
they then actually covered from the depredations of the 
British army." 

Among his writings the journal kept by the Reverend 
Mr. Carroll, while traveling with the Hon. Mr. Stour- 
ton, is of a most interesting nature, referring particularly 
to Alsace and Lorraine, whose beautiful names have 
become donblv historic. 



116 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

A correspondence of some length was carried on be- 
tween the Bishop of Baltimore, who was also the recog- 
nized bishop of the thirteen original States, and a writer 
who signed himself "Liberal" in the public prints. 
This correspondence opened by an attack on the part of 
" Liberal " upon the church and its most distinguished 
representative in America. 

These letters served only to gain a greater degree of 
admiration and respect for John, Bishop of Baltimore, 
rather than, as his enemies seemed to hope, humiliation 
and reproach. Not long after this, he sent to the Pres- 
ident of the United States an eloquent appeal in behalf 
of his fellow-countrymen of the Eoman faith. To this 
paper were attached the names of John Carroll, in behalf 
of the clergy, and those of Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, 
Daniel Carroll, Thomas Fitzsimmons and Dominick 
Lynch, on the part of the laity. 

In the address to the President, the following occurs : 
" In war you shield them from the ravages of armed 
hostility ; in peace you establish public tranquility by 
the justice and moderation, not less than by the vigor, 
of your government. By example, as well as by vigi- 
lance, you extend the influence of laws on the manners 
of our fellow-citizens. You encourage respect for re- 
ligion, and inculcate, by words and actions, that princi- 
ple on which the welfare of nations so much depends, 
that a superintending Providence governs the events of 
the world, and watches over the conduct of men/' The 
reply to this address was dictated by that magnanimity 
of soul that gave Washington his fame. Having re- 
ceived from a tribe of Indians in the north, a petition, 
asking that clergymen be sent to their aid, Archbishop 
Carroll sent to Europe for two French priests to act as 
missionaries, who responded with holy zeal to the call. 
On the 22nd of February, 1800, Archbishop Carroll, in 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL 117 

response to an invitation from the Congress, delivered 
an address upon the character and life of General 
Washington, the departed hero. The discourse was 
given in Saint Peter's Church, in Baltimore city. 

The following extracts, taken therefrom, must suffice 
as an example : 

" When the death of men distinguished by superior 
talents, high endowments, and eminent services to their 
country, demands the expression of public mourning 
and grief, their loss is accompanied, generally, with this 
mitigation, that however grievous and painful, it is not 
irreparable; and that the void caused by their mortality 
will, perhaps, be filled up by others, uniting equal abili- 
ties with the same zeal and watchfulness for the general 
welfare. Hope then wipes off the tears with which 
sorrow bedews the grave of departed worth. But on 
the present occasion, no such consolation can be admin- 
istered ; for he, whose expectations are most sanguine, 
dares not promise again to his country the union of so 
many splendid and useful virtues as adorned that illus- 
trious man, whose memory excites our grateful and ten- 
der sensibility, and to whose tomb the homage of his 
country is to be solemnly offered on this day. Whether 
we consult our own experience, by bringing into com- 
parison with Washington any of our contemporaries, 
most eminent for their talents, virtues and services, or 
whether we search through the pages of history, to dis- 
cover in them a character of equal fame, justice and 
truth will acknowledge that he stands supereminent and 
unrivaled in the annals of mankind, and that no one 
before him, acting in such a variety of new and arduous 
situations, bore with him to the grave a reputation as 
clear from lawless ambition, and as undefiled by injus- 
tice or oppression: a reputation neither depressed by 
indolence, nor weakened by irresolution, nor shadowed 
10 



118 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

by those imperfections, which seemed to be the essential 
appendages of human nature, till Providence exhibited 
in Washington this extraordinary phenomenon. What 
language can be equal to the excellence of such a char- 
acter ? ......... Pardon, 0, departed 

spirit of the first of heroes ! if, with the cold accents 
of an exhausted imagination, I likewise dare attempt to 
celebrate thy name, whilst so many sons of genius, ar- 
dent in youthful vigor, delineate in glowing colors the 
vivid features of thy mind, and the glorious deeds of 
thy virtuous life. With unequal steps, I venture on the 
same career, not seeking to add lustre to the fame of 
Washington, or perpetuate his memory to future times ; 
for he is already enshrined in the records of immortal- 
ity ; but humbly hoping that a recital of his services 
will open to our countrymen the road to true honor, 
and kindle in their breasts the warmth of generous 

emulation and real patriotism 

Modest as he was eminent in valor and wisdom, he con- 
templated with mingled emotions of self-diffidence and 
generous resolution, the important stake placed in his 
hands ; the subjection or independence, the vassalage 
or freedom of an immense territory, destined to be the 
habitation of countless millions. When, therefore, in 
obedience to the voice of his country, he placed himself 
at the head of her army, the expressions of his depend- 
ence on Providence should never be forgotten. Claim- 
ing no personal merit, apprehensive of injuring the 
public interest through some misconduct ; yet trusting 
to the justice of his cause, and conscious of the purity 
of his motives, he called upon his fellow-citizens to re- 
member that he depended for success, not on his own 
military skill, but on the God of battles, to whom he 

made his solemn appeal 

" Tender of the blood of his fellow-soldiers, and 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 119 

never exposing their lives without cause or prospect of 
advantage, humanity was as dear to him as victory, as 
his enemies that fell into his power always experienced. 
" When a decree of retaliation became necessary to re- 
strain their licentious excesses, with what delicacy, 
without the least abatement of fortitude, did he save 
the life of the victim, devoted to atone for the cruelty 
that had been committed on an American officer ! Not, 
however, till he had compelled the opposing general to 
restrain and disavow outrages, that aggravate so much 

the necessary evils of war The 

last act of his supreme magistracy was to inculcate, in 
most impressive language, on his countrymen, or rather 
on his dearest children, this, his deliberate and solemn 
advice, to bear incessantly in their minds that nations 
and individuals are under the moral government of an 
infinitely wise and just Providence, that the foundations 
of their happiness are morality and religion, and their 
union amongst themselves their rock of safety ; that to 
venerate their Constitution and its laws is to insure 
their liberty." 

Archbishop Carroll laid the corner-stone of the 
Cathedral at Baltimore on the 7th day of July, 1806. 
In the month of June, 1876, the Cathedral being com- 
pleted and its debt removed, it was consecrated by Arch- 
bishop James Roosevelt Bayley, of Baltimore. 

The architect of the building was B. H. Latrobe, 
Esq., of Baltimore, a gentleman of culture and talents 
of a rare order. 

Archbishop Carroll, it will be remembered, was one of 
the delegates chosen to visit the people of Canada dur- 
ing the Revolutionary period. Among the movers for 
the good of the public, his name was always prominent. 
It is found on the records of the old Board of Visitors 
to Saint John's College, at Annapolis, with those of 
other distinguished men of the times. 



120 THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 

Archbishop Carroll was a true patriot. Closely linked 
with a love of God was his love of country. The purest 
patriotism is blended with religion ; its fire purges the 
motive from the taint of earthly ambition that seeks an 
utterly selfish glory. 

He was a friend to the poor in word and deed, giving 
them, to the fullest extent of his means, his surest help. 
He was, as are ever the truly great, unostentatious. 
The following passage from one of the contemporary 
papers thus refers to the Archbishop immediately after 
his death : 

" The character of Archbishop Carroll seemed indeed 
to be filled up with wonderful care. He viewed the 
manners of different nations, saw the courts of kings 
and the meetings of philosophers, and added the liber- 
ality of a true philosopher and the accomplishments of 
a gentleman to the apostolic dignity of his calling. 
Temptation drew forth the purity of his virtue, and 
like Shadrach, he walked erect in the flames. He early 
marked the rise of the baneful meteor of French 
Philosophy; but he gathered his spiritual children 
under his wings, and protected them in security. He 
was permitted to witness a great revival of religion, 
and, in the abundant prosperity of his particular 
church, to reap the harvest of his toil and labor of his 
life." 

He died on Sunday, the 3d of December, 1815, at his 
residence in Baltimore. He was in the eightieth year 
of his age, with clear and calm intellectual faculties. 
In response to his expressed desire, he was placed upon 
the floor, that he might die in a more humble posture, 
and thus render his last inevitable sacrifice as accepta- 
ble as possible in the eyes of his Creator. A circum- 
stance which has often been told of, evinced his rare 
perception and peacefulness at the approach of death : 



THE MOST REVEREND JOHN CARROLL. 121 

A discussion having arisen as to the proper ceremonies, 
and the religious observances attending the decease of 
an Archbishop, the book containing the necessary forms 
was discovered to be in the chamber of the dying pre- 
late. Some one quietly entered the room for the pur- 
pose of removing the book. Without turning his head, 
the Archbishop spoke, saying that he knew what was 
needed, and directed attention to the shelf where the 
volume rested. He guarded jealously all Church honors, 
whose glory reverts to God. Before departing, he re- 
quested to have read to him the beautiful psalm of 
David, " Have mercy on me, God, according to Thy 
great mercy !" To him who had only offered sacrifice 
to God, we must believe that "according to the multi- 
tude " of " tender mercies," much love was shown in 
Heaven. 

A full and very interesting account of the life and 
labors of Archbishop Carroll is given by Eichard H. 
Clarke, in the volume entitled " The Lives of the De- 
ceased Bishops of the Catholic Church in the United 
States of America." 




10* 



WHEN SOFT STARS. 



"IT/" HEN soft stars are peeping 
ft Through the pure azure sky, 
And southern gales sweeping 

Their warm breathings by. 
Like sweet music pealing 

Far o'er the blue sea, 
There comes o'er me stealing 

Sweet memories of thee. 

The bright rose, when faded, 

Flings forth o'er its tomb 
Its velvet leaves laded 

With silent perfume; 
Thus round me will hover, 

In grief, or in glee, 
Till life's dieam be over, 

Sweet memories of thee. 



As a sweet lute, that lingers 

In silence alone, 
Unswept by light fingers, 

Scarce murmurs a tone, 
My young heart resembled 

That lute, light and free, 
'Till o'er its chords trembled 

Those memories of thee. 
Amelia B. Welby. 



CHABLES WILSON PEALE, 

Artist. 




HE Reverend Charles Peale, of Edith Weston, 
in the county of Rutland, England, was an 
Episcopal clergyman. He died at Stamford, 
Lincolnshire, in the year 1724. His son, 
Charles Peale, had been educated for the English min- 
istry, but preferred coming to America. He settled in 
Maryland and married Margaret Triggs ; and after the 
birth of their first child, they removed from Queen Anne 
to Chestertown, in Kent county, in the same State. 
Here he became the master of the county school, receiv- 
ing day and boarding scholars. Surveying was taught 
by Mr. Peale, as well as the classics. Following the 
bent of his father, he occasionally occupied the. pulpit. 
Among existing relics of tne past is a letter-book of 
Charles Peale; the incidents noted on its pages date 
from 1745 to 1747. In a bold, manly hand, he addresses 
his "sister and only relation:" "On St, George's day, 
the 23d of April last, I had a most charming boy born 
to me, whom my friends, particularly Mr. Sterling, 
would, for the honor of our English patron, oblige me 
to call St. George ; and my thanks be to God, Charles 
gro^s apace, but is just such another dirty, wading 
sloven, as I can remember myself to have been at his 
age and older." We may judge from this that the baby 



124 CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

artist whose pictures were as yet nnpainted, did not sit 
with clasped hands gazing on the cloudless sky, but 
preferred, like other little boys and girls of more ordi- 
nary cast, to dabble in the gutter or shape mud-pies. 
This sister, to whom Mr. Peale addresses himself, was 
held very near to his heart. She married the Keverend 
Joseph Digby, and in another letter he congratulates her 
upon "her spouse being made rector of St. Mary's, 
Stamford, in Lincolnshire." 

Mr. Charles Peale died in Chestertown, Maryland, in 
the year 1750. He left a widow and five children ; the 
eldest, Charles Wilson, whose birth is thus recorded in 
Saint Paul's Parish, Queen Anne county : " Charles Wil- 
son, eldest son of Charles Peale, and heir intail to the 
Manor of Wotten, in Oxfordshire, estate of Charles Wil- 
son, Doctor of Medicine." Th3 other children were as 
follows: Margaret Jane, St. George, Elizabeth Digby, 
and James. Not long after the death of her husband, 
Mrs. Peale moved to Annapolis, and Charles Wilson, 
who was then in his ninth year, was placed at school. 
Yet, before he had reached his thirteenth year, the " heir 
intail to the Manor of Wotten " was apprenticed to a 
saddler. While following his calling his genius grad- 
ually developed; hegained a fair knowledge of mechanics, 
a habit of industry and early rising, which he retained 
through the days of his life. Under the assistance of 
Mr. James Tilghman, of the Eastern Shore of Maryland, 
he established himself as a saddler, and in this capacity 
developed so decidedly his taste for the fine arts, that he- 
won the admiration of influential friends. A late writer 
says : " He was instructed in painting by Hesselius, a 
German painter, to whom he gave a saddle for the priv- 
ilege of seeing him paint." Funds were placed at his 
disposal that he might go at once to England and study 
with Benjamin West. The money was to be repaid 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 125 

upon his return, with the native gold of his genius. The 
gentlemen who gave their generous trust were the 
staunch men of the period, Mr. J. B. Boardly (who had 
been educated by Mr. Charles Peale), Barrister Carroll, 
Governor Sharpe, Daniel Dulany, Kobert Lloyd, Ben- 
jamin Tasker, Thomas Ringgold, Benjamin Calvert, 
Thomas Sprigg, Daniel, of St. Thomas, and Charles 
Carroll, of Carrollton. He sailed away from his native 
shores in 1768 and returned in June, 1770. 

After laboring for several years he was enabled " to 
pay off all his debts but those of gratitude." He had 
promised to paint pictures for his benefactors, and his 
promise was fulfilled. At the beginning of the Revolu- 
tion against the mother-land, Mr. Peale took his family 
to Charlestown, at the head of the Chesapeake bay. In 
the winter of 1776 he visited Philadelphia, and in the 
month of May following, he removed his family thither 
from Charlestown, and made his home in the Quaker city. 
This decision was doubtless owing to praise and encour- 
agement received, after the painting of several portraits, 
while on a visit to Philadelphia. In 1772 he painted a 
portrait of George Washington in the uniform of a Vir- 
ginia colonel. This picture was at Arlington, the home 
of General Robert E. Lee, for many years, until the war be- 
tween the North and the South. In Tuckerman's " Book 
of Artists " is the following, in regard to this picture : 
" The earliest portraits of Washington are more inter- 
esting, perhaps, as memorials, than as works of art; 
and we can easily imagine that associations endeared 
them to his old comrades. The dress — blue coat, scarlet 
facings and underclothes — of the first portrait by Peale, 
and the youthful face, make it suggestive of the early 
experience of the future commander, when, exchanging 
the surveyor's implements for the colonel's commission, 
he bivouacked in the wilderness of Ohio, the leader of a 



126 CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

motley band of hunters, provincials and savages, to 
confront wily Frenchmen, cut forest roads, and encoun- 
ter all the perils of Indian ambush, inclement skies, un- 
disciplined followers, famine and woodland skirmish. 

"It recalls his calm authority and providential escape 
amid the dismay of Braddock's defeat, and his pleasant 
sensation at the first whistling of bullets in the weary 
march to Fort Necessity. To Charles Wilson Peale we 
owe this precious relic of the chieftain's youth." 

With the first encroachments upon our liberties by 
England, the staunch patriotism of Peale was revealed. 
His earliest contributions to the cause was the design- 
ing and painting of emblematical insignias to be used 
in public displays at Newburyport in New England. 
Upon the mustering of the militia in Philadelphia, he 
was created lieutenant of one of the companies. By 
his energy he soon filled the ranks. This stranger from 
Maryland was then placed at its head as commander, 
and he led his company into the battles of Trenton and 
Princeton. He was brave and self-sacrificing, thinking 
only of his country's need, however stern the demands 
made upon him. He was selected as one of fifty who 
were chosen to remove the public stores from the city 
of Philadelphia, to prevent their capture by the enemy. 
He was one of six persons deputed to secure those who 
were suspected of disloyalty, or else to obtain their 
parole. He was also one of three whose duty was to 
take possession of or sell confiscated estates. During 
his life in camp he did not cease to be an artist, but 
was faithful to his love through all changes. He 
snatched from the surrounding beauties of natural 
scenery subjects for landscapes, perfected in after days ; 
and from the faces gathered about him he secured por- 
traits which are now numbered amongst our most 
valuable possessions. 



CHARLES WILSON PEALB. . 127 

At his death he left a collection of original portraits 
and historical scenes numbering two hundred and 
sixty-nine. 

At Annapolis, in the Chamber of the House of 
Delegates, is a full length portrait of General Wash- 
ington holding in his hand the articles of capitulation 
at Yorktown. Before him passes the Continental army 
in review. General Washington is attended by his 
Aids-de-camp, General La Fayette and Colonel Tilgh- 
man. 

The portraits of the Governors of Maryland, which 
were painted and exchanged for the portrait of Lord 
Baltimore, were Johnson, Paca, Smallwood, Howard, 
Stone and Sprigg. 

The famous picture of Washington, before referred 
to, was finished at Princeton, although its beginning is 
of much earlier date. Congress having adjourned with- 
out making an appropriation for its purchase, it re- 
mained in the possession of the artist. At the request 
of General La Fayette, the artist executed a copy of 
this painting designed for the King of France. It was 
finished and sent to Paris in 1779, but owing to the 
trouble in which the royal family was at the time in- 
volved, it was sold, and purchased by the Count de 
Menou. Don Juan Marrailes, the Minister of France, 
ordered several copies to be made about the same time. 
Some considerable opposition to General Washington 
as a military chief having been evinced in various 
quarters, the following query under the head of 
"Political and Military," appeared in the Maryland 
Journal of July the 6th, 1779 : 

" Whether, therefore, when Mons. Gerard and Don 
Juan de Marrailes, sent over to their respective courts 
the pictures of his Excellency, General Washington, at 
full length, by Mr. Peale, there would have been any 



128 . CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

impropriety m sending oyer, at the same time, at least 
a couple of little heads of Gates and Arnold, by M. de 
Simitierre ?" These vain thrusts did not, however, de- 
prive the army of its head. 

Mr. Tuckerman says : " There is a tradition in the 
Peale family, honorably represented through several 
generations, by public spirit and artistic gifts, that in- 
telligence of one of tfte most important triumphs of the 
American arms was received by Washington in a de- 
spatch he opened while sitting to Wilson Peale for a 
miniature intended for his wife, who was present;" 
and then, "of the fourteen portraits by Peale, that 
exhibiting Washington as a Virginia colonel in the 
colonial force of Great Britain, is the only entire 
portrait. before the Revolution extant. One was painted 
for the college of New Jersey, at Princeton, in 1780, to 
occupy a frame in which a poitrait of George III had 
been destroyed by a cannon-ball during a battle at that 
place on the 3d of January, 1778. Peale's last portrait 
of Washington, executed in 1783, he retained until his 
death." 

The only cabinet portraits of Washington, painted 
by Peale, that are known to exist, are two in the city of 
Washington ; one in the possession of Admiral Kilty, 
of the United States Navy. This picture was painted 
for the father of Admiral Kilty, while George Washing- 
ton was President of the United States. It is painted 
in oil colors, a three quarter face, the dress that of a 
citizen, whose elegance and simplicity of taste belong- 
to the ideal gentleman. The other cabinet painting is 
in the possession of Mr. Henry Randall, of Washington 
city. 

Mr. Peale having been elected to the Assembly of the 
city of Philadelphia, was one of the main movers for 
the passage of the Act for gradual abolition of slavery. 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. , 129 

The world of politics was not, however, suited to the 
taste of Mr. Peale, and he desired to withdraw into 
greater retirement for the purpose of pursuing his 
natural profession. No opportunity had in any case 
been lost, however, where a miniature or sketch could 
be secured of an eminent individual. Thus Mr. Peale 
laid the first foundation of a national gallery. Upon 
the meeting of the Congress at Philadelphia, new sub- 
jects were offered to his genius, and he has left on can- 
vas able representation s of those whose names occupy 
prominent places in history. In this country, in Canada 
and in the West Indies, many homes are adorned with 
the paintings of Charles Wilson Peale. Many of his 
paintings were also sent to Europe. For the space of 
fifteen years, he was without a rival in this country, for 
Trumbull and Stuart were but little known when Peale 
was at the topmost height of his success. A Museum 
of Natural History was also established by Mr. Peale. 
This was the first scientific institution in the United 
States ; as an educator of the people, and a general dis- 
tributor of valuable knowledge, it was a national bene- 
faction. After a brief illness, the death of Charles 
Wilson Peale occurred on the 22nd of February, 1827. 
He was in the eighty-sixth year of his age when he 
passed into rest from a life of incessant labor. His 
friend Trumbull, the artist, said of him "that he pos- 
sessed a high claim to the esteem and remembrance of 
his countrymen, not only owing to his talents, but be- 
cause he was a mild, benevolent and good man." The 
ardor and impulse of youth seemed never to desert him 
entirely, for he threw into whatever work he undertook, 
the whole interest and force of his spirit. That great 
man, Thackeray, has written: "The muse of painting 
is a lady whose social station is not altogether recog- 
nized with us as yet. The polite world permits a gentle- 
11 



130 CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

man to amuse himself with her, but to take her for 
better or for worse! Forsake all other chances, and 
cleave unto her ! To assume her name ! Many a re- 
spectable person would be as much shocked at the notion 
as if his son had married an opera-dancer." 

And yet, Charles Wilson Peale was married three 
times : his first wife being Miss Rachel Brewer, of An- 
napolis, Maryland; then followed Miss Elizabeth De 
Peyster, of New York, and Miss Hannah Moore, of 
Pennsylvania. Four daughters and seven sons survived 
him. The accompanying account of the portrait of 
Lord Baltimore, is from the pen of Mr. Titian Ramsay 
Peale, a son of the artist whose life is given in the pre- 
ceding pages : 

History of the Portrait of Cecilius Calvert, 
Second Lord Baltimore. 

In the "Annals of Annapolis," published in 1841, 
by David Ridgely, he says: "Anne Arundel county, 
probably so-called on 6th of April, 1850, from the 
maiden name of Lady Baltimore, then late deceased, 
Lady Anne Arundel, the daughter of Lord Arundel of 
Wardour, whom Cecilius, Lord Baltimore, had married. 

" In 1683, it was constituted a town, port, and place of 
trade, under the name of the town land at Proctors. 

" In 1694, it was constituted a town, port, and place of 
trade, under the name of Anne Arundel town." 

In 1702, Queen Anne ascended the throne. 

In 1703, the town of Anne Arundel, being incorpo- 
rated as a city, received the name of Ann-apolis, in honor 
of the Queen. The Queen had Sir Godfrey Kneller, 
the court painter of that day, paint her portrait, and 
sent it, with the portrait of Cecilius, Second Lord Balti- 
more, and founder of the Province of Maryland, a gift 
to the city of Annapolis, in recognition of the compli- 
ment of naming the city after her. 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 131 

In 1704, a portrait of Queen Anne, and one of Lord 
Baltimore, full length, are mentioned as decorating the 
Assembly room at Annapolis. 

The Queen's portrait disappeared about the time of 
the Eevolution, when there was little respect for royalty 
or for royal gifts, and nothing has ever been heard of it; 
it was probably destroyed. 

Lord Baltimore's portrait was left undisturbed until 
the State House needed renovating in 1823, when the 
massive oak frame had become so defective, from the 
ravages of worms, that it swayed at one corner, and the 
dust and lamp-smoke of one hundred and twenty years 
had so discolored the picture, that it was no longer an 
attractive object, and it was put out of sight. 

Charles Wilson Peale was born in Maryland in 1741, 
and lived in Annapolis from the time he was nine years 
old until quite middle life. This portrait of Lord 
Baltimore, by Vandyke, was his admiration as long as 
he lived there — returning in after years for renewed 
pleasure in seeing it — was surprised and indignant to 
find this fine picture, with its deeply interesting his- 
torical associations, thrust in a dark lumber-room, where, 
among old joists and broken beams, it would soon have 
been destroyed. He chided them for this slight to the 
Founder of their State. Their answer was, they had 
rather have their present Governor than any old founder ; 
and his answer, that he would give all the Governors 
they ever had for it. They — the Aldermen — at once 
caught at what they considered an offer, — made a list 
of the Governors since the Eevolution. Judge Brewer 
wished and urged him to take the picture to save it. 

Mr. Peale went to Baltimore. His Autobiography 
says : " Before leaving Baltimore he wrote to his friend, 
Mr. Nicholas Brewer, wishing him to take upon him- 
self the trouble to inquire if the corporation of the 



132 CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

city would take six portraits of the Governors elected 
into that office since the Eevolution, for a whole length 
portrait of Lord Baltimore, which is in the ball-room 
(the place it was known as hanging), and perhaps not 
much regarded. The commencing a collection of por- 
traits, which probably will be continued, by adding 
the portraits of the living Governors in succession, will 
in a future day become very interesting, and he would 
find a pleasure to be the author of the beginning of 
such a work. . . . After his return to Philadel- 
phia he received a letter from his friend Mr. Brewer, 
with the order of the honorable Board of the Corpora- 
tion accepting his offer, and also giving orders for the 
picture to be sent as directed " From Baltimore he 
writes to Dr. Oasine, Washington, June 12, 1824: 

" By direction of the Honorable the Corporation of 
Annapolis, I have to paint a portrait of my friend, the 
former Governor of Maryland, Col. Stone. Gen. Smith 
informs me that you married a daughter of Governor 
Stone — hence I am led to hope that you possess the 
likeness which I am very desirous to hand down to 
posterity in a collection of portraits of the Governors 
of Maryland elected since the Revolution. I have now 
finished four of them, u e., Johnson, Paca, Smallwood, 
and Col. Howard. In the order I had from the corpo- 
ration, was the name of Henry, but unfortunately no 
portrait was made of him, which his son now greatly 
regrets. If you possess the portrait in question, and 
will permit me to make a copy of it, I shall be very 
thankful." June 15, he writes to his son Rembrandt: 
"Yesterday I received a letter from Dr. Casine, of 
Washington ; he says he has a portrait painted by you 
of Governor Stone, which he is so obliging as to lend 
me, and would send to Baltimore if I required it. But 
my determination is to go to Washington by to-mor- 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 133 

row's stage, and shall have this advantage if I choose 
to use it; that is, taking the portrait of Gov. Sprigg, 
who resides a short distance from Washington. I shall 
write to Mr. Jno. Lee, in which case I may take the 
stage from Washington to Fredericktown, and make a 
copy, if such portrait can be had." 

The Autobiography says: "Having finished and 
varnished the portraits, he prepared to go to Annapolis 

in the steamboat After dining, he 

told Mr. Brewer that he had brought the six portraits 
which he had finished for the corporation, and if it 
would be agreeable to him, to let them be put into his 
spare parlor, in order to show to the members of the 
corporation by invitation, in the morning ; this favor 
was readily granted. Before breakfast, he unpacked 
and placed them in regular order, then went to Mr. 
Boyle's, who is Mayor of the city, to acquaint him that 
he had finished his engagement, if the corporation 
would be satisfied with the two portraits he had painted 
instead of Gov. Lee and Gov. Henry, of whom no por- 
traits had been made. Mr. Boyle came to see the 
pictures ; said he would give notice to the corporation 
to meet in the evening, to whom I drew up a short 
address, June 28, 1824. Went to Mr. Nicholas Brewer, 
Jr., to dine and spend the afternoon ; returning in the 
evening, Mr. Boyle told him the corporation had accepted 
his paintings." 

In a letter dated Philadelphia, January 16, 1824, Mr. 
Peale says: "I have taken the mastic varnish from the 
Baltimore portrait. I expected to get much lampblack 
by washing, as it must have been much smoked by the 
candles in the ball-room. Simply washing with cold 
water brings away very little of it, and whether I ought 
to use other means is rather doubtful. Rembrandt has 
a pamphlet directing the French method of cleaning 
11* 



134 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 



pictures ; when I have perused it, I shall proceed with 
the work." 

To his eldest son, Eaphaelle, he writes from Phila- 
delphia, February, 1824 : " I have finished the cleaning; 
and repairing Lord Baltimore; it now only wants 
varnishing. It is a highly finished picture. Eem- 
brandt and some others think it was painted by Sir 
Godfry Kneller ; be it whom it may, it is certainly a 
well-finished picture, and I am satisfied with my 
bargain." 

" This letter tells of the first questioning of the artist 
of this fine old picture. The impression was received 
from the well-known fact, that Sir Godfry Kneller 
painted Queen Anne's portrait, as it is in all the lists of 
crowned heads he painted, and being sent with hers by 
the Queen, the conclusion was drawn one hundred and 
twenty years after it came to the country that the same 
artist painted both. 

" Sir Godfry Kneller was born in 1C48 ; was twenty- 
seven when Lord Baltimore died in 1675, aged seventy 
— he could only have known and represented him as a 
man of nearly seventy. Queen Anne was born in 1664; 
was eleven years old when Lord Baltimore died — too 
young for her to have his portrait painted — while the 
Queen could not have had the royal crown picture 
surmounting the arms, as in 1691 the King, by an 
arbitrary act, deprived Charles, Third Lord Baltimore, 
of his political rights as Proprietor, which were not 
restored until 1715, the year after Queen Anne's death. 

" Mr. Peale could never be satisfied that the portrait 
was not a Vandyke ; he had been told so as a boy and 
never heard it questioned ; yet he did not combat the 
opinion of younger men, which is to be regretted, as it 
gave the impression to those who saw it at that time it 
was a Kneller. If he had taken time from his busy 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 135 

life to compare dates and events, he would haye found 
his early memory correct. Mr. Peale had known the 
picture seventy years, when he became the possessor of 
it in 1824, fifty years ago, (in 1874). 

" The picture is one of embarkation. As soon as the 
grant was obtained — 20th June, 1632 — Cecil Calvert 
commenced his preparation for the establishment of a 
colony. The charter made the Proprietor absolute 
Lord of the Province, with the royalties of a Count 
Palatine. The royal grant was given on condition that 
two Indian arrows of those parts should be delivered at 
Windsor Castle every year, on Tuesday in Easter week, 
and also the fifth of all the gold and silver which 
might be found in the Province. The quiver on the 
ground at the right of the picture, is filled with Indian 
arrows ready for the tribute, while the spare arrow and 
the bow lying across it, show the means of keeping it 
full. The quiver is covered with fish skin, the war- 
club near it is made of the beak of the saw-fish — pro- 
ducts of Chesapeake bay — and the Baltimore colours 
draped over them from the base of a drum, shows that 
all is under the Baltimore rule. At the left of the 
picture an Indian is dimly seen, a native of the Prov- 
ince. Lord Baltimore stands in the centre of the 
picture, in a position of commanding dignity, pointing 
with his baton to ' the good ship, the Ark, of three 
hundred tons and upward, which was attended by his 
Lordship's Pinnace, called the Dove, of about fifty 
tons,' in which, with his colonists, he was about to em- 
bark for his new possession. On the lower drapery of 
the sofa, before which he stands, are the Baltimore 
arms, which have the supporters of the Province on 
either side, a ploughman, and a fisherman, surmounted 
by the royal crown of England — the privilege alone of a 
Count Palatinate — showing he rules with royal authority. 



136 CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

"After making preparation, deeming that the interest 
of tne enterprise demanded his remaining in England, 
he confided his colony to his next yonnger brother, 
Leonard, as Governor, then in his twenty-sixth year, 
who embarked from Oowes, Isle of Wight, 22nd of 
November, 1633. The picture must have been painted 
between the 20th of June, 1632, when the patent was 
issued to Cecilius, then twenty-eight, and 22nd of 
November, 1633, when the colonists sailed. 

" Sir Antony Van Dyke was at court painting the 
portrait of King Charles I. At that time Lord Balti- 
more was preparing to embark for the Province the 
King had given him, naming it after his Queen, show- 
ing him to be a favorite at court, circumstances that 
would most likely lead to the painting of his portrait 
by Vandyke, the artist at court. The event pictured 
fixes the date as not later than 1633, which would 
make it two hundred and forty-one years old in 1874. 

" In part third of Smith's Catalogue Kaisonse of the 
works of Dutch, Flemish and French Painters ; London, 
1831 or 38, (two editions); on page 182, under the head 
of Vandyke, is ' portrait of Anne, daughter of Lord 
Arundel, and wife of Cecil Calvert,' Lord Baltimore. 
Anne Arundel, Lord Baltimore's wife, died in 1649, 
aged thirty- four. As Vandyke died 1641, her portrait 
was probably painted when Lord Baltimore's was, in 
1633, and his lost sight of, no doubt, having been out 
of the country one hundred and thirty-four years when 
this list was made in London, in 1838. The original 
must have been sent, as there is no mention of Cecil 
Calvert's, Lord Baltimore, portrait in any of the lists, 
though there is of his wife; and Lord Baltimore's is 
mentioned as being in Annapolis in 1704. 

" Few old pictures can be so well authenticated as 
this, having changed hands but three times, from the 



CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 137 

Queen to Annapolis, from Annapolis to Charles Wilson 
Peale, by Act of Council (which of course is on record), 
in payment for pictures painted for them (portraits 
of several of their Governors), in whose family it has 
been ever since ; his last surviving child and youngest 
son, Titian Eamsay Peale, being the possessor. 

"In 1868. Mr. Franklin Peale had the picture backed 
with new canvas, superintending with great care, and 
assisting himself. The picture is in excellent preser- 
vation." 

The picture referred to has been sent to Boston 
(December, 1874), and placed with the Mont Pensier 
collection, with a view to its sale. Among the numer- 
ous relics in which the Centennial movement seems to 
have awakened an interest, is one in possession of the 
Lotus Club, of New York city. It is a double-faced 
medallion, framed in pure gold, adorned with the minia- 
tures of General George Washington and his wife, 
Martha. The paintings are executed upon ivory, ac- 
cording to the style of that period. The artist, Charles 
Wilson Peale, painted the miniature-portrait of George 
Washington, during the siege of Boston, and afterward 
presented the picture to General Washington. During 
the first presidential term of Washington, the portrait 
of Mrs. Martha Washington was painted; the two pic- 
tures were then enclosed in the same case, with a piece 
of the hair of Washington and his wife, and presented 
by the first President of the United States to his sister, 
Mrs. Betty Lewis. Upon the death of Mrs. Lewis, her 
daughter, Mrs. Carter, became the possessor of this 
valuable relic. From Mrs. Carter, the miniatures passed 
into the hands of Mr. John EL Patterson, the son of 
Mrs. Eleanor Carter Patterson, the grandson of Mrs. 
Carter, and the great grandson of Mrs. Betty Lewis. 
This Mis. Betty Lewis was the mother of Lawrence 
Lewis, who married Miss Nelly Custis. 



138 CHARLES WILSON PEALE. 

Mr. Ridgely, in "The Annals of Annapolis," in a 
description of the Senate Chamber of the State House, 
tells of a portrait of the elder Pitt: "In this picture 
Lord Chatham is represented at full length, in the atti- 
tude and costume of a Roman orator, with decorations 
of emblematical figures, expressive of his noble princi- 
ples. It was painted by Charles Wilson Peale (who 
was a native of Annapolis), while in England, and pre- 
sented, by him, in the year 1794, to his native State." 

Thus is the subject of this picture described by 
Colonel Henry Lee, in his " Memoirs," writing of this 
bold defender of American rights ; he says : " Towering 
in genius, superb in eloquence, decisive in council, bold 
in action, loving England first and England always, 
adored by the mass of the people, and dreaded by the 
enemies of English liberty, he unceasingly cherished 
the good old cause, for which Hampden fought and 
Sidney bled." 

It is not to be supposed that the love, the patriotism, 
the sacrifices, and continued labors of Peale, were ap- 
preciated according to value in his " day and genera- 
tion." 

Thackeray says of the glorious gift of the artist, 
"Art is truth : and truth is religion; and its study and 
practice, a daily work of pious duty." And, again, he 
says, this man who understood the nature of the world, 
the heart of nature, and the individual heart of man or 
woman, " The world enters into the artist's studio, and 
scornfully bids him a price for his genius, or makes dull 
pretence to admire it. What know you of his art ?" 



'TIS ABSENCE PROVES. 



?TUS absence proves with touchstone rare, 

J_ If firm or frail the heart ; 
Pure gold a shining trace leaves there, 

No base ore can impart. 

Tried thus, and true, hope gently folds 

Her network round the soul, 
And each frail web a fond wish holds 

To draw it to its goal. 

Thus have I sought within my breast, 

If falseness there could be, 
But every fibre stands impressed 

With constancy to thee. 

Like lark at morn, on upward wings, 

My spirit strives to soar, 
And with a loving fancy springs 

Back to its own once more. 

Clear as yon star, when we're apart, 
Let faith's pure flame then burn, 

Best proof how one devoted heart, 
At least, for thee doth yearn. 

As mountain stream the valley seeks, 

As rivers seek the sea, 
As back the wood its echo speaks, 

So bounds my heart to thee, 
George Hay Ringgold. 



MARGARET JANE RAMSAY. 




MONO the many women of the Revolution 
who sacrificed comfort and safety to the aid 
and furtherance of their country's cause was 
Mrs. Ramsay, the wife of Captain Nathaniel 
Ramsay, afterward a Colonel, and well known in 
American history for brave deeds. Mrs. Ramsay was 
the daughter of Mr. Charles Peale, and the sister of 
Charles Wilson Peale, the artist. God, the impartial 
giver of blessings, who bestows as generously on women 
as on men the noble gifts of intellect, showered special 
blessings on Margaret Jane Peale, who is thus written 
of by her father in a letter to his sister: "My dearest 
Jenny, who is my delight, is grown a fine girl, but at 
this time has unfortunately got an intermitting fever, 
but hope God Almighty will bless her with the recovery 
of her health." This "fine girl," thus noted in an old 
letter-book, lived to do good, and win its reward in 
later days. She was celebrated for her beauty as well 
as for the more lasting treasures of mind and heart. 
Her fondness for literature induced the cultivation of 
her intellectual faculties to a full degree, thus winning 
the homage of intelligent and accomplished admirers. 
When quite young she married a merchant of Annapolis, 
who, dying in a few years, left a youthful widow. She 
then became the wife of Mr. Nathaniel Ramsay, a 
lawyer, and the brother of the well-known historian. 






MARGARET JANE RAMSAY. 



141 



He settled at Charlestown, in Maryland, at the head of 
Chesapeake Bay, and there commenced the practice of 
his profession. Yet, in the simple language of truth : 
" he would rather heal a breach than widen it, and in 
that way lost many a fee." He never made subservient 
to a love of gain his honor, that true shield of man- 
hood. When the British arrived at Boston, in Massa- 
chusetts, there was a call for troops throughout the 
Colonies. Maryland responded quickly; and when 
Smallwood was appointed Colonel, Nathaniel Eamsay 
received a captaincy in the same regiment. His heart 
was in his work, therefore it was well done. The 
regiment soon filled, and marched toward New York. 
The British, having abandoned Boston, had taken pos- 
session of Staten Island and Long Island. Ridgely's 
"Annals of Annapolis" furnishes the following from a 
Philadelphia letter of August the 31st, 1776 : 

"Smallwood's battalion of Marylanders were dis- 
tinguished in the field by the most intrepid courage, 
the most regular use of the musket, and judicious 
movements of the body. When our party was over- 
powered and broken by superior numbers surrounding 
them on all sides, three companies of the Maryland 
battalion broke the enemy's lines and fought their way 
through. The Maryland battalion lost two hundred 
men and twelve officers — severe fate. It is said our 
whole loss is five or six hundred." In the same year, 
Colonel Ramsay wrote in reply to a complimentary 
communication from Baltimore : " That battalion, sir, 
esteem it but their duty to march to the assistance of 
any part of the Province when attacked, or in danger 
of it ; but they march with greater alacrity to your as- 
sistance, from the pleasing memory of former connec- 
tions, and a sense of the value and importance of 
Baltimore town to the Province in general." 
12 



142 MARGARET JANE RAMSAY. 

Only the quieter portion of this story belongs to 
Margaret Kamsay. It is given to but few women to 
perform notable deeds in the time of war ; yet were but 
one half of their sacrifices, made in the name of love 
and honor, recorded, the bright "historic roll" of 
armies would fade into insignificance before the vic- 
tories of woman. Upon the departure from home of 
her husband, Mrs. Eamsay gave up house-keeping and 
went to her brother with the intention of remaining 
with him until the termination of the war. When the 
battle of Long Island was fought, however, the reports, 
so conflicting, and laden with destruction and death, 
filled her heart with anxiety. She expressed her deter- 
mination to go to the scene of action, saying she would 
rather be with the army, whatever might be her suffer- 
ing, than at a distance enduring the torments of sus- 
pense, for if she were near the army she might, in case 
of misfortune, aid those most dear to her. Mrs. Ramsay 
was provided with a chaise in which she carried a small 
military chest complete in all its belongings. She 
moved with that portion of the army under her hus- 
band's command, following at a safe and convenient 
distance. While stationary she usually lived at some 
farm-house in the neighborhood. Her home, for the 
time, was the constant meeting-place for the officers 
of the regiment, who, when off duty sought relaxation 
from camp-life in the society of this cultured woman. 
Sitting together, they re-fought their battles over their 
coffee, sang songs, or related anecdotes of military life, 
and doubtless Mrs. Ramsay was sometimes made the 
recipient of confidence regarding other passages at 
arms with that annoying enemy of mankind, who in- 
fests " the court, the camp, the grove." When travel- 
ing from place to place, sometimes to avoid danger, at 
others to obtain provisions, etc., for her husband or 



MARGARET JANE RAMSAY. 143 

friends, she was usually accompanied by a servant. 
Thus in the States of New York, New Jersey and 
Pennsylvania, she won many friends. It may be im- 
agined that Mrs. Kamsay was the heroine of numerous 
adventures, following in the rear of the army, and 
almost in the shadow of the foeman's lines. 

When General Washington took up his winter 
quarters at Valley Forge, the soldiers built huts of 
logs filled in with earth. Captain Ramsay, now pro- 
moted to a Colonel, had quite a eosey log hut situated 
on rising ground and facing toward the south. Here 
the Maryland officers, not unfrequently accompanied by 
the officers of other corps, would spend most agreeable 
hours. 

We are all familiar with the pathetic story of that 
camp-life, where our brave fore-fathers, bare-footed, 
freezing, and hungry, sat staring into the face of 
death ; where with a stern resistance, only born of a 
rightful cause, they strove, and endured, and died, to 
win us our liberty ! 

A portion of the Maryland Line being ordered to 
Wilmington, New Jersey, Colonel Kamsay, accompanied 
by his wife, removed to the residence of Mr. Lee, a friend 
of theirs, who treated them with great hospitality. 

Upon the evacuation of Philadelphia by the British, 
they proceeded toward New York. Now took place 
the famous battle of Monmouth, and in this engage- 
ment Colonel Ramsay was complimented by General 
Washington, who called out to him that he " was one 
of the officers he should rely upon to check the enemy 
that day." 

In this battle he was wounded and taken prisoner ; 
that night the British marched toward Amboy, and 
Colonel Ramsay was conveyed to Princeton, where he 
remained at the house of Mrs. Sargent until his wounds 



144 MARGARET JANE RAMSAY. 

were healed. He went then to New York ; he had been 
on parole, but was sent, after this, with the other pris- 
oners of the Maryland Line, to Long Island. Mrs. 
Ramsay accompanied her husband, and they were sup- 
plied with money whenever a safe conveyance could be 
found by her brother, Charles Wilson Peale. Striving 
to forget as much as possible their captivity, the officers 
of the Maryland Line, bound by the ties of brotherhood, 
associated constantly together. 

After the declaration of peace Colonel Ramsay, with 
his wife, removed to the city of Baltimore, where they 
occupied a house on Calvert street. While in Baltimore 
he held an important position in public affairs ; finally 
he sold his house in that city and removed, with his wife, 
to Annapolis. Here, also, Colonel Ramsay took a prom- 
inent part amongst the distinguished men of that 
period. 

The home of Colonel Ramsay was the resort of the 
elegant and the noted people of the day. His wife and 
himself were as hostess and host unsurpassed among the 
hospitable citizens of Annapolis. 

By judicious speculation and wise management, 
Colonel Ramsay amassed a handsome fortune. He 
purchased a large farm, extending for a considerable 
distance along the mouth of the Susquehanna river, 
and here they lived in happiness and comfort for several 
years. Finally, the health of Mrs. Ramsay failed ; she 
lingered awhile and then died. She was mourned as a 
cheerful companion, and a sincere friend, by those who 
knew of her faithful life and strong heart. To those 
who were afflicted with illness, sorrow or want, she 
extended her helpful, willing hands, always ready to 
bestow and never asking earthly reward. 

This is but the dim outlining of a woman's life, with 
few recorded incidents ; yet, it is another link in that 






MARGARET JANE RAMSAY. 145 

long bright chain that binds the present to the great 
past, whose sweetest stories — 

Like pearls from out the hearts of shells, 
Like bird-notes from the bosky wood, 
Like words of trust from far-off friends, 
We hold as good. 




.2* 



THE AMERICAN SWORD, 



SWORD of our gallent fathers, defenders of the brave, 
Of Washington upon the field, and Perry on the wave ! 
Well might Columbia's foemen beneath thy death-strokes reel, 
For each hand was firm that drew thee, and each heart as true 

as steel ; 
There's not a tarnish on thy sheen, a rust upon thy blade; 
Though the noble hands that drew thee are in dust and ashes laid, 
Thou'rt still the scourge of tyrants, the safeguard of the free, 
Aud may God desert our banner, when we surrender thee ! 

Sword of a thousand victories! thy splendors led the way, 
When our warriors trod the battle-field in terrible array ; 
Thou wert seen amid the carnage, like au angel in thy wrath ; 
The vanquished, and the vanquisher, bestrewed thy gory path; 
The life-blood of the haughty foe made red the slippery sod, 
Where thy crimson blade descended like the lightning glance 

of God 1 
They poured their ranks like autumn leaves, their life-blood as 

the sea, 
But they battled for a tyrant— we battled to be free ! 

Sword of a thousand heroes, how holy is thy blade, 
So often drawn by Valor's arm, by gentle Pity's stayed ! 
The warrior breathes his vows by thee, and seals it with a kiss, 
He never gives a holier pledge, he asks no more than this; 
And when he girds thee to his side with battle in his face, 
He feels within his single arm, the strength of all his race ; 
He shrines thee in his noble breast, with all things bright and free, 
And may God desert his standard, when he surrenders thee! 

Sword of our Country's battles! forever mayest thou prove, 
Amid Columbia's freemen, the thunderbolt of Jove; 
When like a youthful victress, with her holy flag unfurled, 
She sits amid the nations, the empress of the world. 
Behold the heaven-born goddess, in her glory and increase, 
Extending in her lovely bauds the olive branch of peace, 
Thy glittering steel is girded on, the safeguard of the free, 
And may God desert her standard, when she surrenders thee. 
Amelia B. Welby. 



GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 




ORDECAI GIST was born in Baltimore 
county, in the year 1743. His parents were 
Captain Thomas Gist, and Susan Cockey, 
both descended from respectable English 
families, who settled in Maryland. Mordecai Gist re- 
ceived a thorough education at the private seminary of 
an Episcopal clergyman, who had the direction of the 
parish in which the Gist family resided. The name of 
Gist occurs frequently in the history of the war of the 
French and the Indians with the English. One of the 
name was a colonel in the American army. He was 
Nathaniel Gist, the father of Mrs. Blair, whose husband, 
the Honorable Francis P. Blair, was a venerable repre- 
sentative of Maryland. Colonel Nathaniel Gist was the 
first cousin of Mordecai Gist. This Nathaniel came 
of an energetic race — energetic of mind and body. 
Richard Gist, the grandfather of Nathaniel, was one of 
the surveyors employed to lay out the original Balti- 
more town. The son of Richard was Christopher, who 
acted as guide to General Washii.gton on the route to 
Fort Du Quesne. He afterward saved the life of Wash- 
ington while crossing the Monongahela river upon a 
raft. The ice, driving in thick blocks against the raft, 
gave but little hope of safety to a man thrown suddenly 
into the chill waters of the river. General Washington, 
losing his balance, was precipitated from the raft into 



148 GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 

the stream, and he would, undoubtedly, have been 
drowned, but for the timely aid given by Gist. He was 
a powerful man. He seized Washington, and pulled 
him on to the floating raft, thus saving, perhaps, the 
life of a nation through the life of its chief. Merely 
by so little a thing as the casting of a die is a seemingly 
insignificant event productive of great results. Thus 
was preserved the General to the yet unmarshaled 
armies of the Western World. He was to be the repre- 
sentative of a free people ! Thus was the President of 
a vast Kepublic rescued from perishing by the sturdy 
hand of his guidesman. 

Christopher Gist, and his two sons, Thomas and Na- 
thaniel, fought under Washington in Braddock's army, 
and were present on the field of defeat. Thomas was 
made a prisoner by the Indians, and carried into Canada, 
where he remained for many years. The wife of brave 
Christopher Gist was Miss Violetta Howard, the sister 
of the patriot, John Eager Howard. The name of 
Violetta Howard was transmitted, for honorable keep- 
ing, to Miss Gist, afterward the wife of Francis P. 
Blair, Esq., and the mother of Montgomery Blair, of 
Montgomery county, Maryland. Although these actors 
and their acts belong to a separate time and story from 
those of Mordecai Gist, they point directly to the strong- 
hearted race from whence he sprang. An evidence of 
his inheritance in that particular was given at the 
breaking out of the war of American Independence. 
Heading a band of valiant youths, the flower of Mary- 
land chivalry, he led them forth to battle. Chivalry, 
the true defence of honor, the honor of man, the safe- 
guard of woman, makes lustrous the fairest pages of 
Maryland history ! In January, of the year 1775, they 
were ready for the field, clad in their splendid uniform 
of buff and scarlet. 



GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 149 

In June, of that year, Admiral Lord Howe, with a 
fleet of one hundred and fifty sail, and a lorce of thirty 
thousand men, arrived at Long Island from Halifax. 
Nearly all the inhabitants of New York were in favor 
of British supremacy. Therefore, upon landing, the 
British were received with acclamations and demonstra- 
tions of joy, by the people of Long Island, New York 
and New Jersey. Many of them proved their allegiance, 
by taking oaths to the English Government. On the 
10th day of July, six companies, under the command of 
Smallwood, from Annapolis, joined by three companies 
from Baltimore, embarked for Elk river, and from there 
they marched to New York. This force was incorpo- 
rated into Stirling's Brigade. The four independent 
companies that had remained in Maryland, joined the 
command of Colonel Smallwood, on the 20th day of 
August. These four companies were composed of men 
from the counties of Talbot, Kent, Queen Anne and 
Saint Mary's. The respect and love inspired by the 
Maryland men, 1,444 in number, aroused their comrades 
to renewed vigor. The most important posts could be 
trusted to the keeping of the Maryland men — the most 
dangerous points were guarded by their vigilance. 

From dawn until sunset of seven days the British 
forces were landing on Long Island. They began to 
land on the 21st day of August, and on the 20th the 
Maryland and Delaware troops commenced their march 
for the field. 

The desire of Colonel Smallwood and Lieutenant-Col- 
onel Ware to accompany their command was intense. 
They were at the time, however, acting as members of 
a court-martial, sitting in New York, and General Wash- 
ington would not permit them to depart. The com- 
mand, therefore, devolved upon Major Gist, and with 
him as a leader they marched forth to meet the enemy. 



150 GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 

In this contest, known as the battle of Brooklyn 
Heights, Gist won undying fame as a soldier. 

When the battle was nearly lost to the Americans, 
while Smallwood was on the road to join his band of 
heroes, Lord Stirling, within one mile of the American 
lines, determined on a last struggle against the powerful 
foe. It seemed to those who watched their movements 
in the distance, that they advanced for the purpose of 
surrendering. Yet, what was their agony of heart when 
they beheld this little band with fixed bayonets charge 
undauntedly the gigantic force of Cornwallis. General 
Washington is said to have wrung his hands despairingly, 
as he exclaimed : " Good God ! what brave fellows I 
must this day lose !" This is but a little string of sen- 
tences, a chain of words handed down from one histor- 
ian to another ; yet it is the exclamation of a brave chief 
in behalf of his beloved compatriots. It is an inherit- 
ance of love to Maryland. 

Five times they charged upon the enemy; five times 
they were driven back, yet each time with renewed 
energy they charged again, until at the sixth charge the 
strong ranks of the Britons gave way in confusion. At 
this point the English received reinforcements, and the 
Americans no longer able to resist the overwhelming 
attacks, were compelled to yield. Some surrendered 
themselves under Lord Stirling, as prisoners of war. 
Three companies, with the determination of desperate 
men, cut their way through the ranks of the enemy, and 
retreated in regular order, until gaining a marsh they 
separated and made good their escape. In swimming 
the creek several were drowned. 

The Marylanders, acting as a wall of defence, always 
in the front ranks, were swept away as the leaves of the 
forest before the storm. And yet we see them in all the 
days of battle and disaster, of privation and sorrow 



GENERAL MOBDECAI GIST. 151 

brave and true to their trust. Although our cheeks 
flush, and our eyes grow dim with tears in reading the 
record, with what a throb of pride our hearts go out to 
the memory of their deeds. The very earth that was 
crimsoned with their blood becomes sacred in thought, 
as these victors are made worthy in our esteem of the 
purple and gold that kings wear. God bless them! 

In the battle of White Plains many of the field officers 
were absent, owing to a distressing malady prevailing at 
the time among the American soldiers. On the sick 
list is found the name of Major Gist, who was, at the 
time, in New Jersey. He had, however, the satisfaction 
of learning of the victories gained by his men in their 
hard-fought battle. 

The author of " The Annals of Annapolis " says : " it 
is well known that the Maryland troops discharged 
their duty both in the camp and on the battle-field, and 
exhibited examples of intrepidity and military perfection, 
seldom equaled by the oldest troops." 

In the battles fought on Southern ground Gist won 
his fairest laurels. On the 9th of January, in the year 
1779, the rank of brigadier-general was conferred upon 
him, and the command of the second brigade of the 
Maryland Line was given him. On the red field of 
Camden, in 1780, backed by three Maryland regiments 
and one of Delaware, immemorial fame was gained by 
their almost supernatural resistance. While many other 
regiments fled, panic-stricken, from the field, they still 
struggled, presenting a glittering array of bayonets 
which were to be met and overcome before life was sur- 
rendered. And this the foe found, that at every point 
of the Citadel of Liberty, sentineled by Maryland, a defi- 
ant resistance met him, scarcely yielding with mortal 
life ; for, Phcenix-like, she seemed to rise from the ashes 
of immolation again and again, rushing with renewed 
vigor to the charge. 



152 GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 

The Continentals were finally forced to fly from the 
field, beaten off, but not defeated. In recording this 
sorrowful event, William Gilmore Simms, the poet-his- 
torian of South Carolina, says : " Never did men behave 
better than the Continentals; but they were now com- 
pelled to fly. The only chance that remained to avoid 
a surrender on the field, and escape from the sabres of 
the dragoons, in whom the British were very strong, 
was to break away for the morass in their rear, into 
which they could not be pursued by cavalry. This was 
done, and by this measure, alone, did any part of this 
devoted corps find safety." 

In this contest Delaware lost heavily. Fighting side 
by side with Maryland, their love for each other grew 
and strengthened, and that love belongs to the future 
as to the past. 

The brave Baron De Kalb, the patriot stranger, who 
strove to plant the standard of Freedom on the shores 
of the "Western World, fell on that disastrous day, 
covered with honorable wounds. Dying, he bestowed 
his blessing as a last gift upon the men whom in life 
he had so much loved. To his successor in the com- 
mand, General Smallwood, he expressed his soldiery 
pride and affection for the regiments by which he had 
been immediately surrounded on the field. His last 
words were, "God bless the Maryland Line." The 
time is very far past, yet his benediction has been 
echoed and re-echoed again and again from loyal lips 
to loyal hearts. 

Let us for the sake of his glorious sacrifice keep 
always in proud remembrance the name and the deeds 
of that dauntless German hero ! He is no longer 
visible to us ; yet well might we be pardoned for think- 
ing that though freed from earthly restraints, De Kalb 
still retains his old command, that with uplifted sword 






GENERAL MOEDECAI GIST. 153 

he guards, while leading forever onward the valiant 
soldiers of Maryland. 

In the retreat that day, Gist narrowly escaped death. 
A British dragoon, dashing onward in hot pursuit 
of the retiring army, galloped, with uplifted sword, 
toward the American General. Wheeling his horse sud- 
denly, Gist rushed toward his assailant — at that instant 
a sergeant of Gist's brigade, leveling his musket at the 
Briton, fired and killed him instantly. As he tumbled 
from the saddle the sergeant sprang into his place and 
rode swiftly away. 

After this defeat, General Smallwood and Gist moved 
to Charlotte, North Carolina, for the purpose of rally- 
ing the scattered forces. 

In fulfillment of General Washington's commands the 
seven regiments of the Old Line, Maryland troops, 
were formed into one regiment, to be called the First 
Maryland. This regiment was placed under the com- 
mand of Colonel Otho H. Williams. General Gist at 
the head of a band of supernumerary officers returned 
to Maryland. He was to recruit and form new regi- 
ments as rapidly as possible, to rebuild the broken 
ranks shattered by death and disaster. He was also 
deputed by General Greene to make known the wants of 
the army to the Government authorities, of which he 
writes as follows : " You will please to make all your 
applications in writing, that it may appear hereafter for 
our justification, that we left nothing unessayed to pro- 
mote the public service." 

General Gist returned in good time to aid in the 
final expulsion of the British from the Southern 
country. 

Gist's brigade was composed of the cavalry of the 
Legion and that of the Third and Fourth Virginia 
regiments, which were "under Colonel Baylor; the 
13 



154 GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 

infantry of the Legion, the dismounted dragoons of the 
third regiment, the Delawares, and one hundred men 
from the line under Major Beal. The whole of the 
infantry was placed under command of Colonel Lau- 
rens." With this force Gist protected the country 
lying south and west of the main army. The ravages 
of the British in the interior were beginning to be des- 
perately felt, and were carried on by armed vessels as 
well as by their land forces. General Gist in command 
of the Light Corps took position near the banks of the 
Stono river. It was in this neighborhood, on the 
north side of the Combahee, that Colonel Laurens, so 
noted for his bravery, was posted. With a small body 
of men he sallied forth to attack the enemy. Falling 
into an ambuscade he refused to surrender or retreat. 
His little band was fired upon by the British, and at 
the first fire the brave commander fell mortally 
wounded. • 

When Charleston was surrendered by the British to 
the brave men whose rightful possession it was, Gist in 
the proud beauty of his manhood, rode into the city by 
the side of Moultrie, that flower of Carolina's chivalry. 

Not very long after this time, Peace was proclaimed, 
and the army disbanded for the while, sent happiness 
into the homes of our land. When the day of parting 
drew near, the gallant General Knox proposed the 
establishment of a society among the officers of the 
American Army, which would bind them by ties of 
brotherhood as well as those of patriotism. The first 
meeting for the organization of the society took place 
at the head-quarters of Baron Steuben. Thus was 
established the beginning of the Society of the Cincin- 
nati. The first meeting of the Maryland branch took 
place at the city of Annapolis, on the 21st day of 
November, 1783. General Gist was selected for Vice- 



GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 155 

President of the Society of which he remained a mem- 
ber for the period of seven years and ten months. Each 
member contributed one month's salary to establish a 
pension fund for indigent soldiers of the Revolution. 
This fund is still in existence, and the pensions there- 
from, though small, have done some good work. This 
department of the Order resembles in some respects 
that of " The Poor Knights " in England, about which 
there is a certain degree of pathos which lingers always 
around the good and the beautiful. The membership 
was to be hereditary, descending to the eldest male-heir 
in line. Much dissatisfaction was expressed on every 
side, at what the people regarded as a revival of Old 
World doctrine. General Washington, who desired 
peace in more than words, proposed to the Cincinnati 
the withdrawal of entailments in that Society. 

The American Republicans of that day did not ac- 
knowledge hereditary rights in practice. The Republi- 
cans of the present time do not recognize hereditary 
rights in theory. The advice of the Commander-in-Chief 
was not taken upon this occasion, and the hereditary 
features were retained as they exist at the present day. 
Among the many distinguished members of that body 
was General La Fayette. During the time of his visit 
to Baltimore, in 1824, he was entertained by the Mary- 
land members of the Cincinnati, at a supper given in 
his honor. The entertainment took place at the resi- 
dence of Mr. Buchanan, who gave his house for the 
purpose. Most of the decorations and preparations for 
this feast were made by a venerable and patriotic lady 
of Maryland, Miss Sallie Merryman. 

General Gist is said to have possessed a frank and 
genial manner, adorned by that polish which perfects a 
native grace. He was six feet in height, finely propor- 
tioned, and well developed. His face was handsome; 



156 GENERAL MORDECAI GIST. 

his eyes were brilliant. His whole countenance re- 
flected the power of his majestic soul. General Gist 
married a Mrs. Carman, of Baltimore county, in his 
native State. She died shortly after her marriage. His 
second wife was Miss Sterrett, of Baltimore city. This 
lady died in giving birth to a son. 

General Gist then proved his loyalty to the fairer por- 
tion of creation, by marrying Mrs. Oattell, of South 
Carolina. She also bore him a son. One of his boys 
was named Independent, the other, States. 

A picture of Mrs. Gist; the daughter of Mr. James 
Sterrett, of Baltimore, was lately on exhibition at the 
Art Gallery in " the City of Monuments." 

This lady, the mother of Independent Gist, was a 
noted beauty in her day. The portrait alluded to was 
painted by Charles Wilson Peale, of Maryland, whose 
faithful pictures of the past serve as strengthening links 
in the chain of reminiscences, that might, otherwise, 
have remained broken forever. 

Upon the declaration and establishment of peace, 
General Gist retired to his plantation near Charleston, 
in South Carolina. Here he led the life of a country 
gentleman. He died in the city of Charleston, August 
the 2nd, in the year 1792. 




MY OWN NATIVE LAND. 



Of TALK not to me of fair Italy's sky, 
I Of the soft perfumed gales that through Araby sigh 
I know there is not on this wide- spreading earth 
A land bright and free, as this land of my birth ; 
We have our mild zephyrs and bright sunny beams, 
Our fruits and our flowers, fair valleys and streams; 
Thy rocks and thy mountains are lofty and grand, 
And brave are thy children, my own native land ! 

If cowards and tyrants e'er seek to enchain, 
And bring to the dust our proud spirits again, 
Thy sous, still united, will rally for thee, 
And die, as they've lived, the exalted and freel 
Oh! had I the strength of my heart in my banc], 
I'd fight for thy freedom, my own native land ; 
Amid thy oppressors undaunted I'd fly, 
And fling forth our banner in triumph on high. 
Amelia B. Welby, 




13* 



<M& 




OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 




' I bold not first, though peerless else on earth, 

TLat knightly valor, born of gentle blood, 

And war's long tutelage, which hath made their name 

Blaze like a baleful planet o'er these lands"— John Hay. 

HE greatest soldiers are most frequently the 
offspring of progenitors whose minds and 
principles are of a noble cast. From the good, 
good must come in some shape. Green, the 
biographer, writes of onr soldier- hero: "In character, 
he was warm-hearted and expansive; but upon moral 
questions, firm to a degree, which savored somewhat of 
sternness. As a soldier, he was rigid, in discipline, re- 
quiring from his subordinate the prompt obedience 
which he always paid, to his superiors." Otho Holland 
Williams was descended of Welch ancestry of gentle 
blood. His father was Joseph Williams, his mother, 
Prudence Holland. They had. eight children, namely: 
Mercy, born July 28th, 174G ; Otho Holland, March 1st, 
1749; Elie, February 1st, 1750; Cassandra, December 
27th, 1753; Priscil la, December 27th, 1755; Theresa, 
May 26th, 1758; Cynthia, June 2nd, 1762. 

The subject of this sketch was born in the hospitable 
county of Prince George's, Maryland. The year follow- 
ing his birth his father, Mr. Joseph Williams, removed 



OHIO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 159 

with his family to Frederick county, near the mouth of 
Conococheague creek. Their new home was made in 
the valley bearing the same name as the creek, near to 
the bounds of Washington county. At the age of thir- 
teen, Otho was left fatherless, and through the instru- 
mentality of Mr. Boss, the husband of Mercy Williams, 
he was appointed to a position in the clerk's office of 
Frederick county. He was retained in this office for 
several years, and it was finally given into his full charge. 
He afterward occupied a similar position in the city of 
Baltimore. After the death of Mr. Eoss, his widow 
married Colonel Stull, of Maryland, who proved as faith- 
ful in his friendship to the young Otho as his predeces- 
sor had done. At the age of eighteen he is thus de- 
scribed by General Samuel Smith : " He was about six 
feet high, elegantly formed ; his whole appearance and 
conduct much beyond his years ; his manner such as 
made friends of all who knew him." He was doubtless 
in the words of the immortal "Will:" "With all good 
grace to grace a gentleman," 

From Baltimore we follow him to Frederick town 
once more, where he entered into commercial trade. Its 
golden chains, however, did not prove sufficiently strong 
to hamper the spirit that sprang quickly in answer to 
the call "to arms!" A rifle company was formed in 
Frederick town, under the command of Captain Thomas 
Price; in this company Otho H. Williams was first lieu- 
tenant; while the place of second lieutenant was held by 
John Eoss Key, the father of the nation's poet. 

What may not be hoped for, from a young man who 
thus expresses the sentiments of his heart: " We should 
not hope to be wealthy, or fear to be poor ; we never 
shall want; and whoever considers the true source of 
his happiness, will find it in a great degree arising from 
a delicate concern for those dependent upon him, and 



160 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

the approbation of his friends." He showed at this 
early age the ambition of the truly great, which led him 
to accomplish, by the best means in his power, the work 
allotted to him by the Supreme Task-Master. Hence, 
may be understood by all save the enyious, his words 
here inscribed: "It would giye me pain if the world 
should believe any person with the same advantages 
may do more than I may. Fortune does a great deal in 
all military adventures, and therefore I am not to say 
whether this reproach will come upon me or not. But 
you may rely upon it, my good friend, discretion and 
fortitude shall govern my conduct ; and in the interim, 
I commit myself to that Power whose eye is over all His 
works, and by whose goodness I have been preserved in 
numerous perils." This bold reliance upon the right, 
in all things, taught him to scorn the mean subserviency 
of spirit which recognizes or admits of abuses in high 
places ; this independence he expressed at the beginning 
of his career, as at its more successful points. On the 
march from Frederick to Boston, or in the aid extended 
to the north, nothing of especial note is recorded in re- 
lation to this young soldier. 

In 1776, at the age of twenty-seven, he was promoted 
to the rank of major in a regiment of riflemen, com- 
posed of Maryland and Virginia troops. He was one 
of those valiant men who made so stern a resistance to 
the Hessians at Fort Washington, on the Hudson river. 
He was one of the 2,600 Americans who were made 
captive on that day. Just previous to the surrender, 
which was compelled through the continued assaults of 
the powerful foe, Otho Williams was dangerously 
wounded. During fifteen months, he was held a pris- 
oner. Although deprived of his full liberty, he was, 
for a time, allowed the privilege of his parole on Long 
Island. The friendly relations existing between Williams 



OTIIO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 161 

and Major Ackland, of the British army, and the anec- 
dote connected therewith, are, of course, familiar to 
many readers. It will bear repetition, however, in the 
pleasant telling of the Reverend Osmond Tiffany: "On 
one occasion, after Williams had been dining with Lady 
Ackland, his good friend, the Major, and he, sallied 
forth for a ball, and, although the company was much 
struck with the elegant figures and demeanor of the 
two friends, and although the Briton made all efforts to 
introduce the captive, the gentlemen of the party could 
not forget the enemy, to welcome the stranger, and the 
ladies treated him with extreme coldness. Ackland, 
finding that all his efforts were in vain, took Williams 
by the arm, and led him from the room, saying : " Come, 
this company is too exclusive for us." Major Ackland, 
upon his return to England after the termination of the 
Revolution, was killed in a duel, resulting from a dis- 
pute regarding the bravery of Americana, in which 
Major Ackland took the part of the patriots. Williams 
was accused, during his captivity, of holding a secret 
correspondence with General Washington ; and, without 
trial or defence, he was seized and thrown into the jail 
at New York. The narrow and comfortless cell was 
shared with the well-known Ethen Allen. The suffer- 
ings of these war-prisoners were, perhaps, attributable 
to the low revenge of their jailors — the fate, alas ! of 
full many a captive who has risked his freedom for his 
cause ! 

Bad food, bad air, and deprivations of every sort, 
made sad havoc on the robust constitution of Williams, 
from the effects of which he never wholly recovered. 
Upon the surrender of General Burgoyne, General Gates 
succeeded in obtaining the exchange of Williams, for 
his friend* Major Ackland, of the British army. Before 
the Battle of Monmouth, he was appointed to the Sixth 



162 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

Regiment of the Maryland Line. He was promoted 
while in prison. 

Upon receiving the appointment of colonel, he wrote 
the following letter, addressed to Governor Johnson, of 
Maryland, and which is extracted from Scharf's Chron- 
icles of Baltimore : 

" Fredericktown, March 6th, 1778. 

Sir: — The very honorable appointment which the Assembly 
of the State of Maryland hath been pleased to make me, adds 
an obligation to my natural duty and inclination to serve my 
country with my best abilities. I have not been able to obtain 
a state of the regiment which I expect the honor to command, 
but, from the best information, learn there is not above one 
hundred effective men with Lieutenant-Colonel Ford, and those 
very indifferently clothed. The laws for recruiting and equip- 
ping men in this State (of themselves deficient), I find very 
badly executed, and I could wish it in my power to afford some 
assistance, which I cannot possibly do until I am instructed 
where to get cash, and how to subsist the recruits till they are 
equipped and fit for duty. It would give me great pleasure to 
be advised on this subject. I heartily desire to join the army as 
soon as possible, but certainly it had better be reinforced by a 
regiment without a colonel, than by a colonel without a regi- 
ment. 

" I am your Excellency's most obedient, humble servant, 

Otho H. Williams." 

" His Excellency, Thomas Johnson, Ehj., Governor of 
Maryland." 

In this battle, the Maryland Line added anew to its 
glory, by its deeds of heroism, in telling of which one 
of its soldiers, of the sixth regiment, said : " We had 
the pleasure of driving the enemy off the field at Mon- 
mouth." The Americans, following up their advantage, 
continued to drive the British before them. Before the 
close of the day the enemy took up a strong position 
on the ground where they had met with their first re- 
verse from the Maryland troops. Whilst the Americans 



OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 163 

slept upon their arms, dreaming of the morrow's battle, 
Sir Henry Clinton and his red-coat army 

" Folded their tents like the Arabs," 

and with their recorded stealthiness, deserted the field, 
shielded by the darkness of the night. From " Camp 
New Brunswick," July 6th, 1778, General Williams 
wrote the following letter : 

" On the 4th inst., the anniversary of American In- 
dependence was celebrated in the following manner: 
At three o'clock in the afternoon a cannon was dis- 
charged as a signal for the troops to get under arms ; 
half an hour afterward, the second fire was a signal for 
the troops to begin their march, and at four, the third 
signal was giy.en for the troops to draw up in two lines, 
on the west side of the Karitan, which they did in beau- 
tiful order. A flag was then hoisted for the feu de joie 
to begin. Thirteen pieces of artillery were then dis- 
charged, and a running fire of small arms went through 
the lines, beginning at the right of the front line, catch- 
ing the left, and ending at the right of the second line. 
The field-pieces, in the intervals of brigades, were dis- 
charged in the running fire, thus affording a harmonious 
and uniform display of music and fire, which was thrice 
well executed. After the feu dejoie, the general officers, 
and officers commanding brigades, dined with his Ex- 
cellency. Yesterday, a number of field-officers shared 
the same fate, and I had the satisfaction of seeing the 
old warrior in very fine spirits." 

Although General Williams had few opportunities in 
the northern country of proving his prowess on the 
battle-field, he was noted throughout the army as a 
disciplinarian. In reporting an officer to General 
Greene for disobedience of orders, he once wrote : 
" When orders are received with contempt, and re- 



164 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

jected with insolence, examples are requisite to re-estab- 
lish subordination, the basis of discipline" 

The South was to hold the field wherefrom his 
brightest laurels should be culled, and thither he 
inarched with those brave men who seemed to bear on 
the point of sabre and bayonet the jeweled touch-stone 
of victory. Persecution, wrong, hatred, fled before the 
glittering wall of steel that flashed beneath the southern 
sun. 

Brave soldiers of a noble cause, 

Staunch winners in a loyal fight, 
We yield thee now, our hearts' applause, 

Our homage to the Eight in Might ! 

Ah, olden heroes ! passed away 
Beyond those heights where ever stands 

The Goddess who through night and day 
Holds clustering laurels in her hands, 

For those whose brows are pure and strong, 

And fitted to the victor's crown, 
Whose valor makes the poets' song, 

Whose deeds are rung by fair renown. 

With silver trumpet forth she flies, 

The Herald to the ranks of Fame, 
And as the battling soldier dies 

She flings abroad the hero's name. 

Brave soldiers of a noble cause, 

Staunch winners in a royal fight, 
We yield thee now, our hearts' applause, 

Our homage to the Might in Right ! 

The cruelty and depredations of the British in the 
South are well-known to all intelligent readers. The 
rule of Sir Henry Clinton, who had gone thither from 
the North, was heavily felt; and when from the blood- 
red train of war Tarleton and his minions burst forth, 



OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 165 

the hearts of the South were stricken with terror. The 
name of Tarleton is even now uttered by Southerners 
with a degree of scorn little lessened by time, that is 
said to work such marvels, The paths that he followed, 
the headquarters he occupied, each and all are pointed 
to and told of with their romantic traditions. 

General Williams, writing to his brother, leaves the 
following note of that mournful period : " There are a 
few virtuous good men in this State, and in Georgia; 
but a great majority of the people are composed of the 
most unprincipled, abandoned, vicious vagrants that 
ever inhabited the earth. The daily deliberate murders 
committed by pretended Whigs, and reputed Tories 
(men who are actually neither one thing nor another in 
principle), are too numerous and too shocking to relate. 
The licentiousness of various classes and denominations 
of villains desolate this country, impoverish all who 
attempt to live by other means, and destroy the strength 
and resources of the country, which ought to be col- 
lected and united against a common enemy. You may 
rely on it, my dear brother, that the enemy have had 
such footing and influence in this country that their 
success in putting the inhabitants together by the ears, 
has exceeded even their own expectations. The distrac- 
tion that prevails surpasses anything I ever before wit- 
nessed, and equals any idea which your imagination can 
conceive of a desperate and inveterate civil war." 

The words of Mr. Tiffinay, from whose interesting 
pamphlet is gathered much of the material of this 
sketch, describe well the enduring love and bravery of 
the southern women : "They would, with the courage 
of Joan of Arc, have grasped the sword, and perished at 
the stake. They would not. give their hand in the light 
dance to a Briton; they gave their heart with their 
hand to the meanest of their countrymen. They threw 
14 



166 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

the gold bracelet into the scale to lighten the iron fetter. 
They feared not the contagion of the prison ships, nor 
the damp of the dungeon. They instilled into their 
drooping relatives new hopes, and urged them once more 
to draw the sword and throw away the scabbard." 

At this time of need the French soldier, La Fayette, 
and other foreigners, had come to the assistance of the 
struggling colonists ; their names gaining new praises as 
they went on their way, uttered with enthusiasm by the 
patriots. Braced by hope they renewed the contest with 
an ardor that had of late commenced to lose force, for 
misfortune seemed to hang lowering above them. 

Sickness and hunger added to their sufferings in the 
fatiguing march ; yet with unshaken resolve they en- 
dured to the death. On the battle-field of Camden 
Williams, with his brave followers, swept through the 
thickest of the fight. When he besought the Sixth 
Maryland to stand firm, the valiant Ford replied : " They 
have done all that can be expected of them, we are out- 
numbered and outflanked. See, the enemy charge with 
bayonets I" 

The tried soldier, John Eager Howard, served in this 
battle, as lieutenant under Williams. 

Here fell the dauntless DeKalb, pierced to death by 
the bullets of the enemy; this was on the 16th of 
August, 1780. 

In Johnson's " Life of Greene," the author says, in 
allusion to Williams' narrative of Gates' defeat : " It is 
an invaluable historical fragment, and would, perhaps, 
never have appeared in print had it not been inserted 
here. I publish it as a tribute of respect to the memory 
of a man too little known to the American people." 

The wants of the army at this time increasing, Gene- 
ral Greene, on his way to the south, writes from Annap- 
olis : " General Gist is at this place, and says, ' it is idle 



OTnO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 1G7 

to expect service from the southern army unless they 
receive supplies from the northward, to put them in a 
condition to act, and that it is equally idle to expect 
anything south of this, especially clothing; nor will 
there be anything of consequence to be had in this 
State.'" ' 

The next battle of importance after Camden, was that 
of King's Mountain, where, through rugged way and 
fastness, Victory led on for the Americans, and planted 
upon its topmost peak her standard. In this engage- 
ment with the enemy Williams, of Maryland, had no 
part; yet one of that name, belonging to South Carolina, 
won much fame by his heroism. 

General Nathaniel Greene, when he succeeded General 
Gates in the south, perceived, with keen appreciativeness, 
the merits of Otho Holland Williams, whom he made 
deputy adjutant general. From that time forth he went 
conquering on his way, adding each day new honors to 
his unsullied name. 

One week had elapsed before the glad news of the vic- 
torious termination of the battle of the Cowpens was 
received by that portion of the army encamped upon the 
banks of the Pedee. To the brave mountaineer, Morgan, 
Otho Williams wrote: "We have had a feu de joie, 
drank all your healths, swore you were the finest fellows 
on earth, and love you, if possible, more than ever. The 
General has, I think, made his compliments in very 
handsome terms. Inclosed is a copy of his orders. It 
was written immediately after we received the news, and 
during the operation of some cherry-bounce." 

When we contrast with the immense armies of to-day 
the little bodies of cavalry or infantry that marched over 
rocky ways, and'through marshy forests to gain liberty 
for us, the picture would seem ludicrous were it not so 
full of sorrow. Truly were they " the finest fellows on 



168 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

earth," who hungry, bare-footed, and nearly naked, 
strove against winter's wind and rain; gaining new 
honors for themselves and a free-hold to their successors 
in the land. All of that portion of the story is unutter- 
ably sad. The ludicrous only belongs to the descend- 
ants of those patriots, who, boasting of their ancestry, 
depend upon strangers for the record of those deeds 
which should be familiar to them from their earliest 
childhood. Satisfied with having been told that their 
"blood is good," and that their fore-fathers did some- 
thing which entitled them to distinction, they are una- 
ble to tell of the nature of the deeds of which they 
boast. 

There is also another class of people who insist that, 
as Republicans, they have no right to be proud of ances- 
tors of great name or noble lineage ; and so they scorn 
the graciousness of remembering that alone of which 
they have any reason to be proud. If, with the same 
degree of determination with which they refuse to fol- 
low upward their greatness, they would abstain also 
from imitating the follies and the vices of their progeni- 
tors, we might look to see a grander Republic, free of 
stain or reproach. 

After the defeat of the unfortunate Gates, Williams 
was in command of the rear-guard of the army in its 
retreat through North Carolina. His reputation as a 
disciplinarian was, if possible, more firmly established, 
after this perfectly conducted march. General Greene, 
in writing to him at this time, says : " You have the 
flower of the army; do not. expose the men too much, 
lest our situation should grow more critical." Fording 
the swollen rivers and narrow streams, they left the 
enemy behind to gaze across the muddy waters as hope- 
lessly, almost, as the army of Pharaoh is said to have 
looked after the children of Israel in their passage 
through the Red Sea. 






OTIIO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 1G9 

On the first of March, 1781, the Battle of Guilford 
Court House took place. The Americans fared badly, 
and were forced to retreat. On the 25th of April, 
another battle took place at Camden. From the camp 
before this place, Williams writes to his brother two 
days following the action : " The army lost a glorious 
opportunity of gaining a complete victory, taking the 
town, and biasing the beam of fortune greatly in favor 
of our cause. The loss was nearly equal on both sides, 
if we do not consider the loss of opportunity. We lost 
about one hundred and thirty killed and wounded, and 
from account, the enemy were not more lucky. The 
cavalry, the light infantry, and the guards acquired all 
the honor, and the infantry of the battalions all the 
disgrace, that fell upon our shoulders. The cavalry, led 
on by Washington, behaved in a manner truly heroic. 
He charged the British army in the rear, took a great 
number of prisoners, sent many of them off with small 
detachments, and when he saw we were turning our 
backs upon victory in front, by a circuitous maneuvre, 
he threw his dragoons into our rear, passed the line and 
charged the York volunteers (a fine corps of cavalry), 
killed a number, and drove the rest out of the field. 
Washington is an elegant officer; his reputation is de- 
servedly great. Many of our officers are mortally mor- 
tified at our late inglorious retreat. I say mortally, be- 
cause I cannot doubt that some of us must fall, in en- 
deavoring, the next opportunity, to re-establish our 
reputation. Dear reputation, what trouble do you not 
occasion, what danger do you not expose us to ! Who, 
but for it, would patiently persevere in prosecuting a 
war, with the mere remnant of a fugitive army, in a 
country made desolate by repeated ravages, and rendered 
sterile by streams of blood ? Who, but for reputation 
would sustain the varied evils that daily attend the life 
14* 



170 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

of a soldier, and expose him to jeopardy every hour ? 
Liberty, thou basis of reputation, suffer me not to forget 
the cause of my country, nor to murmur at my fate !" 

The brave young officer of whom he spoke so glow- 
ingly, was William Washington, of Stafford county, 
Virginia, and a distant relative of the Commander-in- 
Chief of the American armies. This battle is known 
as that of Hobkirk's Hill. 

On the 22nd of May, 1781, the Americans began the 
attack on Ninety-Six, a small, fortified village near the 
Saluda river, in the State of South Carolina. The siege 
lasted twenty-eight days, in which the Americans lost 
one hundred and eighty-five men. The Americans were 
unsuccessful, and of them General Greene writes : "I 
have only to lament that such brave men fell in an un- 
successful attempt." Colonel Williams, in writing to 
his brother, alludes regretfully to the defeat : " We were 
obliged to relinquish an object which, if attained, would 
not only have given peace to this distracted country, but 
would have added a lustre to our former services suffi- 
ciently brilliant to have thrown a proper light upon the 
character of our excellent General, and reflected a ray 
of glory upon each inferior officer. Though we have 
been greatly disappointed, no troops ever deserved more 
credit for their exertions. The operations were prose- 
cuted with indefatigable zeal and bravery, and the place 
was defended with spirit and address. Our loss is Cap- 
tain Armstrong, of the Maryland Line, killed; Captain 
Benson, dangerously wounded, and Lieutenant Duval, 
also wounded. Besides officers, we lost fifty-eight men 
killed, sixty-nine wounded, and twenty missing." 

At the battle of Eutaw, Otho Williams was in com- 
mand of two battalions of Marylanders, which Green^ 
in his " Life of Nathaniel Greene," calls "the best corps 
in the army." Through this fight AVilliams swept like 



OHIO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 1*71 

the Angel of Death, bearing down all before him. 
Greene says of the Maryland troops: "Williams and 
Howard were with them, and they knew that the 
bayonet alone could give them victory." 

In writing of this battle, Colonel Williams thus con- 
cludes a letter: "Upon re-perusal of this circumstantial 
sheet, I do not think I have said enough of the bravery 
of the American troops. To have an idea of their 
vivacity and intrepidity, you must have shared their 
danger and seen their charge, which exceeded anything 
of the sort I ever saw before. The battle of Eutaw was 
an example of what I conceive to be obstinate, fair 
field-fighting, and it is worthy of remark, that it hap- 
pened on the same spot of ground where, according to 
the tradition of this country, a very bloody, desperate 
battle was fought about a century ago between the 
savage natives and the barbarous Europeans who came 
to dispossess them of their property, which, in soil, is 
as rich as any upon the continent, or can be anywhere 
else. On the spot where the conflict of bayonets de- 
cided the victory, is a monument or mound of earth, 
said to have been erected over the bodies of the brave 
Indians who fell in defence of their country. Will any 
such honorable testimoney be erected to the memory of 
our departed heroes ?" 

General Greene says with regard to this battle : " I 
cannot help acknowledging my obligations to Colonel 
Williams for his great activity on this and many other 
occasions, in forming the army, and for his intrepidity 
in leading on the Maryland troops to the charge." 

After this contest the Americans did not so much 
dread the strength of the English in which the greatest 
reliance had heretofore been felt by friend as well as 
foe. Fever, famine, and exposure were more to be 
dreaded than those visible foes well-clad, well-fed, and 
well-armed. 



172 OTIIO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

The following letter from Scharf s Chronicles, dated 
July the 7th, 1782, was written by Colonel Williams in 
behalf of the starving soldiers, to Thomas Sim Lee, the 
Governor of Maryland : 

Sir — My attachment to the service of my country, and the 
interest I feel in whatever concerns the honor and happiness of 
my fellow-soldiers, are the only considerations which induce me 
to communicate to your Excellency the complaints of the Mary- 
land Line now with the Southern Army. It is known and ac- 
knowledged that the troops of the State, ever since the com" 
mencement of the Revolution, have participated in the greatest 
fatigues and perseverance, and that in the extremity of their 
sufferings, their complaints have always approached the ear of 
civil authority with humility and respect. 

It is also known that since the Maryland troops have served 
in the Southern States (which is now more than two years), they 
have upon the most arduous occasions given the highest satis- 
faction to the generals who have successively commanded the 
Southern Army, and particularly to their present enterprising 
commanding officer, General Greene, under whom they have per- 
formed the most gallant services. And that they are the only 
troops who have constantly kept the field under every difficulty 
since the Spring of 1780, without a shilling of pay real or nomi- 
nal, without a supply of clothing at any time equal to their 
necessities, and without any other subsistence than what, with 
the assistance of the rest of the army, they have occasionally 
collected, by force of arms, in a country once entirely in subjec- 
tion, and in a very great degree attached to the enemy. No dis- 
tress, no dangers have ever shaken the firmness of their spirits, 
nor induced them to swerve from their duty. They have a long 
time patiently suffered the neglect of their country, not without 
murmuring, it is true, but without mutiny or disaffection to a 
cause which they are endeavoring to maintain with their blood. 
But what man or body of men will long forbear to express their 
apprehensions of injustice when they find some of their com- 
panions disbanding themselves and receiving compensation for 
past services, and others reinlisted, or new levies, in the same 
service receiving large bounties in specie for three years, which 
they who have already served twice that time have never re- 



OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 173 

ceived nor expected, and that every corps by which they have 
been reinforced, from time to time, have received more or less 
cash for pay, subsistence, etc., before they could be induced to 
march from the State in which they were incorporated. 

A part of the troops now with the southern army has, I am 
well informed, received pay for seveial months, and some corps 
belonging to the northern army have received pay from the states 
in which they were raised. 

These considerations, and similar ones which might be added, 
will, and do naturally, occasion jealousies which may, in their 
consequences, produce very unhappy effects. 

I would not be understood to insinuate that the officers have 
not virtue enough to submit to every species of neglect, injustice 
and partiality that can be imposed, sooner than concur in any- 
thing fatal to the community they serve ; but the common sol- 
diers, who are men of less consideration, will compel them to 
waive the exercise of their authority, or reduce them to the un- 
happy necessity of maintaining a slavish discipline by examples 
dreadful to humanity.- 

I, therefore, most humbly solicit, in behalf of both officers and 
soldiers, that your Excellency, with the concurrence of your 
Council, will be pleased to address the honorable the Congress 
to instruct the minister of finance to appropriate a part of the 
specie tax to be levied in this State, to the payment of the Mary- 
land troops ; and that the same may be put into the hands of a 
proper person for that purpose, so soon as it is collected. I can- 
not doubt, if this should be granted, and the good people of 
Maryland should be advertised of the purpose for which the 
money is to be raised, that speedy voluntary payments will anti- 
cipate the necessity of executing property for the tax according 
to the Act of Assembly, and prevent those calamitous conse- 
quences that may attend a continuance of their grievances. I 
beg that the occasion may be my apology for giving your Excel- 
lency this trouble. With the greatest respect and esteem, I am 
your Excellency's most obedient and most humble servant, 

O. H. Williams. 

His Excellency Governor T. S. Lee. 

It is not possible, in a brief sketch, to follow, step by 
step, the career of this brave man, who gave the best he 
had to bestow, to his country's service. Being sent by 



174 OTIIO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

General Greene with dispatches to Congress, he received, 
during that time, the honorary title of brevet brigadier- 
general, which circumstance caused among the other 
colonels of the army a feeling of displeasure. In a letter 
to General Williams, General Greene says : 

"The love of rank is so strong a principle in the 
breast of a soldier, that he who has a right to promo- 
tion will never admit another over his head upon a 
principle of merit. You must content yourself with 
having obtained it, and that no man is without his ene- 
mies but a fool. I am glad to hear the sentiments of 
the public are so flattering to the southern army. The 
southern states have acted generously by me, and if I 
can close the business honorably here, I shall feel doubly 
happy; happy for the people, and happy for myself. I 
think the public are not a little indebted for our exer- 
tions. The southern states were lost, they are now re- 
stored ; the American arms were in disgrace, they are 
now in high reputation. The American soldiery were 
thought to want both patience and fortitude to contend 
with difficulties; they are now remarkable for both. 
That sentiment had taken deep root in Europe, but it 
is now totally changed. Indeed the change of British 
administration is in a great degree owing to our efforts, 

and the consequences resulting from them 

At the time the battle of Eutaw was fought by the ene- 
my, from returns laid before Parliament, it appears they 
had in Charleston and in their advanced army, 6,700 
men fit for duty, besides all the militia and negroes. 
What an amazing difference between their force and 
ours ? From these authorities, I find our operations 
were much more glorious than ever we considered 
them." 

The following letter, addressed to a friend, is taken 
from " Lee's Memoirs ;" it was written after Williams 



OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 1*75 

had been promoted to the brigadier-generalship. It is 
dated May 18th, 1782: 

My Dear Pendleton : — Your laconic epistle of the 20th 
April was banded to me by General St. Clair, in the situation 
you wished. Involved in a scene of the most agreeable amuse- 
ments, I have scarcely had time for reflection ; therefore, if I have 
been guilty of any omission toward you, or any other of my 
southern friends, I hope it will be imputed to the infatuating 
pleasures of the Metropolis. My promotion (for which I am 
principally indebted to my invaluable friend, General Greene,) 
might prove the efficacy of making a short campaign to court 
(especially as it had been once rejected), if the circumstances 
which attended it did not too evidently discover how much the 
greatest men are actuated by caprice, and how liable the most 
respectable bodies are to inconsistencies. Upon the application 
of General Greene, seconded by the recommendation of Wash- 
ington, the votes of Congress were taken, whether I should or 
should not be made a brigadier, in consequence of former re- 
solves, which very clearly, in my opinion, gave me a right to 
promotion. It was resolved in the negative. Upon the second 
motion in Congress, the same letters were reconsidered, and the 
man whose legal claim was rejected (because it was inconveni- 
ent, or might give umbrage to others), is promoted in considera- 
tion of his distinguished talents and services. I wish I may be 
always able to justify and maintain an opinion that does me so 
much honor. If Congress will please to wink at my imperfec- 
tions, I will be careful not to meddle with theirs. 

Among the heroes of the Kevolution, none are better 
entitled to our veneration and gratitude than Otho 
Holland Williams. His bravery was only surpassed by 
many sacrifices made to Liberty, who, though represent- 
ing the people, attains her throne through the proudest 
blood of a nation. 

In the quieter life of a private citizen, General Wil- 
liams preserved the respect of his fellowmen, won on 
the hazardous field of glory. 

On the 21st of November, 1783, he was elected Treas- 
urer of the Society of the Cincinnati, of which General 
George Washington was the President. 



176 OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 

After the close of the war, he received the appoint- 
ment of Collector of Customs of the port in Baltimore, 
which office was conferred upon him by General Wash- 
ington. 

On the 18th of October, 1785, he married Miss Mary 
Smith, the second daughter of William Smith, Esquire, 
a merchant of influence and wealth in the city of Balti- 
more. His children, by this happy marriage, were five 
sons, whose names indicate, in some measure, the love 
of the father for his patriotic companions. They were 
Robert Smith, William Elie, Edward Green, Henry Lee 
and Otho Holland. 

Not long before his death, he was offered the actual 
rank of brigadier-general, which honor he refused to 
accept. His health declining, he undertook a voyage to 
the Barbadoes in 1793, hoping to experience a benefit 
from the salt air. A slight improvement in health was 
of short duration. 

In the following year of 1794, while on the way to 
the Sweet Springs of Virginia, overcome by illness, he 
was forced to stop at the small town of Woodstock. 
Here he died on the 15th of July. His body was taken 
to his farm, the home of his childhood, on the banks of 
the river Potomac. He was buried in the family grave- 
yard at " Springfield," where he sleeps undisturbed in 
the shadow of the busy little town of Willi am sport. 

On page 109, of Green's history, he says of Williams : 
" Beginning his military career with no advantages of 
military training, his rare intelligence led him directly 
to the true sources, and gave him a clear perception of 
the fundamental principles of the science. His counsel 
was always the counsel of a clear, deep and perspicuous 
mind. His conduct in the field was ardor, tempered by 
judgment and self-possession; his bearing in camp 
the system which gives vigor to discipline, and insures 






OTHO HOLLAND WILLIAMS. 177 

the punctual fulfillment of every duty. Greene, who 
had known him in the north, took him at once into his 
counsels, and communicated his thoughts and designs 
to him with a freedom and confidence which he seems 
to have felt with no other but Henry Lee." 

He died at the age of forty-five. Mr. Tiffany says of 
him : " He was prepared ; he had lived the full measure 
of his fame; his life had been glorious and happy; he 
had shrunk from no responsibility; he had feared noth- 
ing but to do wrong; he had gained l honor, love, obedi- 
ence, troops of friends/ and when at last he met the 
unconquerable foe, it was with the same calm courage 
and reliance on a higher power that had been his trust 
when he had rushed into mortal battle." 

In Lee's Memoirs we find the following brave tribute 
to the brave man : " There was a loftiness and liberality 
in his character which forbade resort to intrigue and 
hypocrisy in the accomplishment of his views, and re- 
jected the contemptible practice of disparaging others 
to exalt himself. In the field of battle he was self- 
possessed, intelligent and ardent ; in camp circumspect, 
attentive and systematic ; in counsel sincere, deep and 
perspicuous. During the campaigns of General 
Greene he was uniformly one of his few advisers, and 
held his unchanged confidence. Nor was he less es- 
teemed by his brother officers, or less respected by his 
soldiery." 

Thus ends the reading of a soldier's story — a soldier 
who was loyal to his God as to his country. To bravery 
and purity of life was joined the courtliness of a modern 
Bayard. What more can be required of a man ? Not 
illy chosen seems the family motto : " He who suffers 
conquers !" 



15 



OH ! WOULD I WERE WITH THEE 
FOREVER ! 



OH ! would I were witb tbee forever, 
Oh ! would that we never might part, 
That the joy that now thrills me might ever 

Fill up every vein of my heart. 
I have traveled the fairy world over, 

I have tasted of many a bliss ; 
But 'twas madness to hope to discover 
The wealth of a moment like this. 

Fate might point to the hour with her finger, 

That should tear me asunder from thee, 
Yet my spirit would near thee still linger, 

And laugh at the harmless decree. 
But no fancies like these will I cherish, 

Nor fear the sweet dream will not last- 
That the bliss of this moment will perish, 

Or live but a dream of the past. 

No ! enough that I know thou art near me, 

Enough that I feel thou art inine — 
As you gaze in my face, that you hear me, 

In accents responding to thine. 
Then away with the future before me, 

Like a syren still singing of bliss, 
Not the breath of all Time can allure me, 

While I live in a moment like this. 

George Hay Ringgold, 

United Hates Army. 



"THE BOAST OF MARYLAND, 




" He was desirous of fame ; of that fame which alone is endur- 
iDg; the fame which reposes on sound learning, exalted genius 
and diligent, nay, incessant study."— Story. 

ILLIAM PINKNEY was born at Annapolis, 
on the Severn river, in the State of Mary- 
land, the 17th day of March, 1764. His 
father was an Englishman named Jonathan 
Pinkney. He was of Norman descent, his ancestors 
having gone to England with William the Conqueror. 
His mother was a woman of strong intellectual powers 
and great tenderness of heart; to her he owed the first 
part of his education. Jonathan Pinkney was a Royal- 
ist, espousing that cause with great warmth during the 
struggle for independence. The boy, however, chose to 
be a patriot of a more decided order. Sparks, in his 
biographical sketch of Pinkney, says that " one of the 
freaks of his patriotism was to escape from the vigi- 
lance of his parents, and mount night-guard with the 
soldiers in the fort at Annapolis." 

Having imbibed in these early years a hatred of op- 
pression and oppressors, it inspired at a later period 
some of his noblest efforts. Owing to the poverty forced 
upon him by the confiscation of his father's property, 
his classical education was rather limited. His teacher, 



180 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

Mr. Bref-hard, who was the Principal of the King 
William School, took a profound interest in the em- 
bryo statesman, at that time just thirteen years of age. 
(In the College Eegister for 1794, the name of William 
Pinkney is entered on the Board of Visitors chosen for 
that year.) Struggling against the inflictions of pride 
and poverty, he endeavored to earn his livelihood by 
labor. It is said that he entered an apothecary store in 
the city of Baltimore, and while there began the study 
of medicine under Doctor Dorsey. From this rather 
obscure position he was drawn by the learned Samuel 
Chase, under whose direction and encouragement Pink- 
ney began the study of the law at the age of nineteen. 

He appeared as a practitioner before the bar in the 
year 1786. Leaving Annapolis he went to Harford 
county, on the Susquehanna river, where his first pro- 
fessional efforts saw the light. From this district he 
was sent as a delegate to the State Convention, which 
ratified the Constitution of the United States of America, 
in 1788. In October of the same year he was chosen 
and sent as a member of the House of Delegates. 

The eloquent utterances of this wonderful son of genius 
is counted among the proudest memorials of historical 
Maryland. His nephew, the Eeverend William Pinkney, 
thus writes of his gifted kinsman : " With a voice of un- 
common melody and power, an elocution beautifully 
accurate, and action graceful and impressive, he held 
the listening crowds upon his tongue in rapt astonish- 
ment and wonder. The tradition is still alive in Mary- 
land, which echoes the widespread rumor of his fame." 
He opposed the law that denied to the slaveholder the 
power of manumitting those slaves at will. Although 
battling, as he did, against a host of opponents, his for- 
cible arguments and lucid reasoning won him many 
adherents even in the camp of the enemy. 






WILLIAM PINKNEY. 181 

"If," he said, "emancipation can be effected with the 
owner's consent, while his understanding is legally com- 
petent to the act, I care not through what medium — 
fraud excepted — should he reduce his family to beggary 
by it ; I should not be the one to repine at the deed. I 
should glory in the cause of their distress, while I wished 
them a more honest patrimony." 

Sparks says: "This speech breathes all the fire of 
youth, and a generous enthusiasm for the rights of 
human nature, although it may not perhaps be thought 
to give any pledge of those great powers of eloquence 
and reasoning which he afterward displayed in his 
mature efforts." 

The same writer, in referring again to the abolition of 
slavery in this country, says: "The more mature and 
ripened judgment of Mr. Pinkney, as a statesman, seems 
to have ultimately settled down into the conviction that 
colonization was the only practical remedy from which 
the removal of this plague-spot could even be hoped 
for." 

William Pinkney began well his peerless career of 
success by an early and happy marriage. So do the 
strongest souls yield most easily to the divine influences 
of love. 

The woman who graced his honorable name was Miss 
Ann Maria Rodgers, the daughter of John Kodgers, Esq., 
of Havre-de-Grace, Maryland. She was the sister of 
the brave Commodore John Rodgers, of the United 
States Navy. She possessed great personal beauty, 
amiability of disposition, and elegance of manner. Her 
intellect was of a superior order, and it retained its vigor 
until the close of a long life. She was the mother of 
ten children, all of whom survived their father. Two 
of these children, at least, were afterward noted men for 
brilliancy of intellect and extraordinary cultivation. 
15* 



182 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

In 1790 he was elected member of Congress, but he 
declined the office. 

In 1792 he was elected a member of the Executive 
Council of Maryland, which position he held for about 
three years. He was for a time President of that body. 
He was appointed by President Washington as Commis- 
sioner from the United States to England in 1796. He 
remained in that country, engaged in important govern- 
ment affairs, until 1804. While in London, and not 
engaged in official or social duties, he occupied the time 
in study. Under the direction of a tutor he pursued 
the study of the Latin language, and cultivated in other 
ways the talents so generously bestowed upon hhn. 
W T hile in Europe he enjoyed the society and friendship 
of many of the most eminent statesmen of that period ; 
amongst his appreciative friends Mr. Pitt was the most 
prominent. 

Lord Holland, who was also intimate with Mr. Pink- 
ney, addressed him the following letter: 

London, June 1st, 1808. 
Dear Sir:— From fear that you might have thought what I 
said to you about your boy a mere matter of form, I write again 
to you, after 1 have talked it over with Lady Holland, to say that 
if we are to encounter the misfortune of a war with America, 
and upon leaving this country you should wish your son to pursue 
his education here, Lady Holland and myself beg to assure you, 
that without the least inconvenience to us, we can take care of 
him during the holidays; aud between them ascertain that he 
is going on properly, and give you all the information you would 
require upou the progress of his studies, state of his health, etc. 
I only entreat you to adopt this plan, if otherwise agreeable aud 
convenient, without scruple, as I assure you we should not 
offer it if we did not feel pleasure in the prospect of its being 
accepted. 

General Washington died in his absence from America, 
in allusion to which he writes to his brother, Mr. Jona- 
than Pinkney , 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 183 

" The death of General Washington has ascertained 
how greatly he was everywhere admired. The pane- 
gyrics that all parties here have combined to bestow 
upon his character have equaled those in America." 

In another letter from London, he expresses himself 
as follows : " I have at all times thought highly of Mr. 
Jefferson, and have never been backward to say so. I 
have never seen, or fancied I saw, in the prospective of 
his administration the calamities and disasters, the anti- 
cipation of which has rilled so many with terror and 
dismay. I thought it certain that a change of men 
would follow his elevation to power — but I did not for- 
bode from it any such change of measures as would put 
in hazard the public happiness. I believed, and do still 
believe, him to be too wise'not to comprehend, and too 
honest not to pursue the substantial interests of the 
United States, which is, in fact, almost impossible to 
mistake, and which he has every possible motive to se- 
cure and promote." — From Pinknet/s Life of Pinkney, 
page 39. 

Upon his return to Annapolis, he was welcomed by 
expressions of public joy. These he responded to in 
the way most characteristic of the statesman and the 
gentleman. Although feeling proud of the genius that 
exalted him so high above most of his contemporaries, 
that genius was never dimmed by the darkness of in- 
gratitude to his fellow-man. He was truly great. He 
lived at a time when greatness meant more than a mere 
name or title, and yet not to be bought as a bauble. 
His greatness was striven for with the energy of life, and 
clasped as a prize by its possessor. His greatness was 
unbestowed of man, nor won by pandering to the popu- 
lar tastes and creeds of the day. Rather did he seek to 
uproot such systems as he deemed pernicious to the life 
and liberty of his beloved land. 



184 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

In 1805 he was appointed Attorney- General of the 
State of Maryland. 

In 1806 he was sent as Envoy Extraordinary to Great- 
Britain, from whence he returned in 1811. On his re- 
turn he was immediately elected a member of the State 
Senate, and at the end of the same year was appointed 
Attorney-General of the United States by President 
Madison. Not long after his appointment to the 
Attorney-Generalship an important case came up for 
decision in the Supreme Court. It related to In- 
ternational Law and the special claims of private 
citizens of the United States against the sovereign 
rights of foreign nations. In referring to the argument 
made by Mr. Pinkney on this occasion, Sparks says: 
" It was maintained by Mr. Pirlkney, as Attorney- General, 
witli an extent of learning, and a force of argument and 
eloquence, which raised him at once in the public esti- 
mation to the head of the American Bar." 

Not satisfied with the might of the pen alone, his sword 
was drawn in defence of his country against the British 
invaders. In command of a company of riflemen, at- 
tached to the third brigade of Maryland militia, he 
fought and was wounded at the Battle of Bladensbnrg. 
He was sent from Baltimore to the National Congress. 
He resigned his seat before the expiration of his term, 
and accepted the appointment of Minister to Russia and 
especial Envoy to Naples, tendered him by President 
Monroe. He seemed wonderfully endowed with graces 
best suited to places of trust and dignity. His manner 
was gracious and winning; his eloquence won a more 
powerful charm through the musical depths of his voice. 
Nor did he scorn the assistance of fashion's latest 
modes. The perfect fit of his gloves lias been com- 
mented upon frequently, and regarded by some staunch 
republicans as a mark of effeminacy, rather than a proof 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 185 

of refined habits and elegant tastes. Upon his return 
to America, he resumed the practice of the law in the 
city of Baltimore. " He was retained in the Supreme 
Court, in 1819, by the Bank of the United States in 
maintaining its claim of exemption from State taxation." 
He continued his labors in the Supreme Court after his 
election to the United States Senate in 1820. The con- 
stant stress upon his nervous energies, of iron strength 
though they seemed, proved too great for him. His en- 
feebled health succumbed to an attack of illness which 
proved fatal. He died on the 25th day of February, 
1822. 

Now, indeed, was Maryland bowed to the dust in 
grief ! Yet rising, she gazed with mournful pride upon 
the grave of her son. On her calm forehead shone the 
name of Pinkney, prelustrous amid the brilliant stars 
that make her glorious diadem ! 

Of him that wise man, Roger Brooke Taney, has 
said: "I have heard almost all the great advocates of 
the United States, both of the past and present genera- 
tion, but I have seen none equal to Pinkney. He was a 
profound lawyer in every department of the science, as 
well as a powerful and eloquent debater." 

His death was announced in the House of Representa- 
tives by the famous John Randolph, of Virginia, who 
said : " 1 rise to announce to the House the not unlooked- 
for death of a man who filled the first place in the pub- 
lic estimation, in the first profession in that estimation, 
in this or any other country. We have been talking of 
General Jackson, and a greater than he is not here, but 
gone forever. I allude, sir, to the boast of Maryland, 
and the pride of the United States — the pride of us all, 
but more particularly the pride and ornament of the 
profession of which you, Mr. Speaker, (Mr. Philip P. 
Barbour,) are a member and an eminent one." 



186 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

Judge Story said that the name of Pinkney was 
" one of the proudest names in the annals of the 
American Bar His language is most ele- 
gant, correct, select and impressive ; his delivery fiuen fe 
and continuous ; his precision the most exact and 
forcible that you can imagine He pos- 
sesses beyond any man I ever saw the power of elegant 

and illustrative amplification His style was 

ornate in the highest degree. Indeed, Chief Justice 
Marshall said of Mr. Pinkney that he never knew his 
equal as a reasoner — so clear and luminous was his 

method of argumentation One who, while 

abroad honored his country by an unequaled display of 
diplomatic service, and on his return illumined the 
halls of justice with an eloquence of argument and 
depth of learned research that have not been exceeded 
in our own age/' 

William Pinkney, like all successful great men, had 
his bitter enemies and his false accusers; yet even they 
who willingly defamed him while living, aided in doing 
honor to the " dead Lion." The hatred born of that 
malignant fiend, Jealousy, disappeared when he, the 
subject of it, was no longer present in their path to 
dispute the right of way to the highest success. By 
the illness of a little more than one week, the life of 
this wonderful man was ended. On the night of the 
25th of February, 1822, he died, in the fifty-eighth year 
of his age, just when the world was echoing, and re- 
echoing, with his oft-repeated name. 

The last book that- he is said to have read was the 
far-famed "Pirate" of Sir Walter Scott; the love of 
the poetic and. romantic did not desert him in his 
arduous labors. The Beautiful seemed ever glowing in 
gold and rose-color upon his vivid word-pictures. The 
most rugged Truth he adorned with the graceful mantle 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 187 

of Poetry, which served to enhance the charms without 
concealing the grand beauty of that stern Monitress. 

Mr. Benton, in his " Thirty Years' View," says : " Mr. 
Pinkney was kind and affable in his temper, free from 
every taint of envy or jealousy, conscious of his powers 
and relying upon them alone for success. He was a 
model, as I have already said, and it will bear repeti- 
tion, to all young men in his habits of study and ap- 
plication, and at more than fifty years of age was still a 
severe student. In politics he classed democratically, 
and was one of the few of our eminent public men who 
never seemed to think of the presidency. Oratory was 
his glory, the Law his profession, the Bar his theatre ; 
and his service in Congress was only a brief episode, 
dazzling each House, for he was a momentary member 
of each, with a single and splendid speech." 

Mr. Tyler, in his Memoir of Chief Justice Taney, 
writes this : " William Pinkney, the great lawyer, was 
then a Senator from Maryland, in the Congress of the 
United States, and stood forth as the champion of the 
equality and sovereignty of a State when admitted into 
the Union. Rufus King, a Senator from New York, a 
man of great ability and high honor, was the leader of 
the party which wished to introduce States into the 
Union manacled by Federal authority. Such was the 
marvelous power of Pinkney's vindication of the right 
of States to be admitted, if admitted at all, into the 
Union on no other conditions than those imposed by 
the Constitution of the United States, that the enemies 
of State sovereignty quailed under his mighty blows. 
Rufus King, while yet subdued by Pinkney's Titanic 
strength, remarked to John Nelson, ' that the speech of 
Pinkney had enlarged his admiration of the capacity of 
the human mind.' " 

Again, the author of Taney's Memoir says: "When I 



188 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

vi as a student of law, Judge John Scott, an eminent 
lawyer of Virginia, told me that soon after the death of 
Mr. Pinkney, Chief Justice Marshall remarked to ' him 
at Richmond, in the presence, of that eminent lawyer, 
Walter Jones, that Mr. Pinkney was the greatest man 
he had ever seen in a Court of Justice;' and that Mr. 
Jones responded, 'yes, no such man has ever appeared 
in any country more than once in a century.' " 

A writer in The Literary World, of 1850, says: "To 
use the language of Mr. Kennedy, (author of Horse 
Shoe Robinson), he asked and gave no quarter. To 
the younger members of the profession he was a warm 
and steadfast friend; to all just and fair. If, in the 
ardent struggle for supremacy with the most renowned 
of his contemporaries, he neither asked nor gave 
quarter, it is no less true that he sought an honorable 
victory, and labored to build up for himself a solid 
granite character — a reputation — the reward of real ac- 
quirements and profound attainments." 

The following proof of Mr. Pinkney's kind feelings 
toward young lawyers is culled from among many of a 
like nature : Joseph Palmer, a young lawyer of Mary- 
land, and in later years a well-known practitioner at the 
Bar, was from illness prevented from attending court. 
The circumstance was told to Mr. Pinkney by the phy- 
sician of Mr. Palmer. Pinkney went at once to the 
young man and asked him for his brief — argued his 
case for him, and, as a matter of course, won it. 

Much has been written and said on the subject of 
Wirt's unjust feeling and the expression of it, with re- 
gard to William Pinkney, his contemporary and pro- 
fessional adversary. The following well-authenticated 
story is, however, more agreeable to record than the 
petty animosities which are always foreign to truly 
great natures. Not long after the death of Mr. Pink- 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 189 

ney, Mr. Ross, a member of the Maryland Bar, was 
returning from Annapolis, where he had attended the 
Court of Appeals. Upon the same steamboat with 
him was Mr. William Wirt. They engaged in conver- 
sation. Mr. Eoss asked Mr. Wirt his opinion of the 
relative abilities of Mr. Webster and Mr. Pinkney as 
lawyers. Mr. Wirt said : " You might as well compare 
a farthing candle to the Sun, as to compare Mr. 
Webster as a lawyer to Mr. Pinkney. Mr. Pinkney 
had an oceanic mind ; and, sir, he had made himself so 
complete a master of International, Maritime, Consti- 
tutional and Municipal Law, that he could count them 
upon his ten fingers. He was the most thoroughly 
equipped lawyer I have ever met in the Courts." 

Extracts from Pinkney's Speech on the 
Missouri Question. 
As I am not a very frequent speaker in this As- 
sembly, and have shown a desire, I trust, rather to 
listen to the wisdom of others than to lay claim to 
superior knowledge by undertaking to advise, even 
when advice, by being seasonable in point of time, 
might have some chance of being profitable, you will 
perhaps bear with me if I venture to trouble you once 
more on that eternal subject which has lingered here 
until all its natural interest is exhausted, and every 
topic connected with it is literally worn to tatters. I 
shall, I assure, sir, speak with laudable brevity — not 
merely on account of the feeble state of my health, and 
from some reverence for the laws of good taste which 
forbid me to speak otherwise, but also from a sense of 
justice to those who honor me with their attention. 
My single purpose, as I suggested yesterday, is to sub- 
ject to a friendly yet close examination some portions 
of a speech, imposing certainly on account of the dis- 
16 



190 WILLIAM PLMKNEY. 

tinguished quarter from whence it came — not very 
imposing (if I may say so, without departing from that 
aespect which I sincerely feel and intend to manifest 
for eminent abilities and long experience) for any other 
reason. 

I believe, Mr. President, that I am about as likely to 
retract an opinion which I have formed as any member 
of this body, who, being a lover of truth, inquires after 
it with diligence before he imagines that he has found 
it; but I suspect that we are all of us so constituted as 
that neither argument nor declamation, leveled against 
recorded and published decision, can easily discover a 
practicable avenue through which it may hope to reach 
either our heads or our hearts. I mention this lest it 
may excite surprise, when I take the liberty to add, 
that the speech of the honorable gentleman from New 
York, upon the great subject with which it was princi- 
pally occupied, has left me as great an infidel as it 
found me. It is possible, indeed, that if I had had the 
good fortune to hear that speech at an earlier stage of 
this debate, when all was fresh and new, although I feel 
confident that the analysis which it contained of the 
Constitution, illustrated as it was by historical anecdote 
rather than by reasoning, it would have been just as un- 
satisfactory to me then as noiv. I might not have been 
altogether unmoved by those warnings of approaching 
evil which it seemed to intimate, especially when taken 
in connection with the observations of the same honor- 
able gentleman on a preceding day, 'that delays in 
disposing of this subject in the manner he desires are 
dangerous, and that we stand on slippery ground/ I 
must be permitted, however (speaking only for myself), 
to say, that the hour of dismay is passed. I have heard 
the tones of the larum bell on all sides, until they have 
become familiar to my ear, and have lost their power to 
appal, if, indeed, they ever possessed it. 






WILLIAM FINKNEY. 191 

Notwithstanding occasional appearances of rather an 
unfavorable description, I have long since persuaded 
myself that the Missouri Question, as it is called, might 
be laid to rest, with innocence and safety, by some con- 
ciliatory compromise at least, by which, as is our duty, 
we might reconcile the extremes of conflicting views 
and feelings, without any sacrifice of constitutional 
principle ; and in any event that the Union would easily 
and triumphantly emerge from those portentous clouds 
with which this controversy is supposed to have en- 
vironed it. I confess to you, nevertheless, that some of 
the principles announced by the honorable gentleman 
from New York,* with an explicitness that reflected the 
highest credit on his candor, did, when they were first 
presented, startle me not a little. They were not, per- 
haps, entirely new. Perhaps I had seen them before in 
some shadowy and doubtful shape, 

" If shape it might be called, that shape had none 
Distinguishable in member, joint or limb." 

But in the honorable gentleman's speech they were 
shadowy and doubtful no longer. He exhibited them 
in forms so boldly and accurately defined, with contours 
so distinctly traced, with features so pronounced and 
striking, that I was unconscious for a moment that they 
might be old acquaintances. I received them as novi 
hospUes within these walls, and gazed upon them with 
astonishment and alarm. I have recovered, however, 
thank God, from this paroxysm of terror, although not 
from that of astonishment. I have sought and found 
tranquility and courage in my former consolatory faith. 
My reliance is that these principles will obtain no gen- 
eral currency ; for, if they should, it requires no gloomy 
imagination to sadden the perspective of the future. 

*Mr. King. 



192 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

My reliance is upon the unsophisticated good sense and 
noble spirit of the American people. 

I have what I may be allowed to call a proud and 
patriotic trust, that they will give countenance to no 
principles which, if followed out to their obvious conse- 
quences, will not only shake the good fabric of the 
Union to its foundations, but reduce it to a melancholy 
ruin. The people of this country, if I do not wholly 
mistake their character, are wise as well as virtuous. 
They know the value of that federal association which 
is to them the single pledge and guarantee of power and 
peace. Their warm and pious affections will cling to it 
as to their only hope of prosperity and happiness, in 
defiance of pernicious abstractions, by whomsoever in- 
culcated, or howsoever seductive and alluring in their 
aspect. 

Sir, it is not an occasion like this, although connected, 
as contrary to all reasonable expectation it has been, 
with fearful and disorganizing theories, which would 
make our estimates, whether fanciful or sound, of 
natural law, the measure of civil rights and political 
sovereignty in the social state, that can harm the Union. 
It must, indeed, be a mighty storm that can push from 
its moorings this sacred ark of the common safety. It 
is not every trifling breeze, however it may be made to sob 
and howl in imitation of the tempest, by the auxiliary 
breath of the ambitious, the timid, or the discontented, 
that can drive this gallant vessel, freighted with every- 
thing that is dear to an American bosom, upon the rocks, 
or lay it a sheer hulk upon the ocean. I may, perhaps, 
mistake the flattering suggestions of Hope (the greatest 
of all flatterers, as we are told) for the conclusions of 
sober reason. Yet it is a pleasing error, if it be an 
error, and no man shall take it from me. I will con- 
tinue to cherish the belief, in defiance of the public 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 193 

patronage given by the honorable gentleman from New- 
York, with more than his ordinary zeal and solemnity, 
to deadly speculations, which, invoking the name of 
God to aid their faculties for mischief, strike at all es- 
tablishments, that the union of these States is formed 
to bear up against far greater shocks than through all 
vicissitudes it is ever likely to encounter. I will con- 
tinue to cherish the belief that, although like all other 
human institutions it may for a season be disturbed, or 
suffer momentary eclipse by the transit across its disk 
of some malignant planet, it possesses a recuperative 
force, a redeeming energy in the hearts of the people, 
that will soon restore it to its wonted calm, and give it 
back its accustomed splendor. On such a subject I will 
discard all hysterical apprehensions — I will deal in no 
sinister auguries — I will indulge in no hypochondriacal 
forebodings. 

I will look forward to the future with gay and cheer- 
ful hope ; and will make the prospect smile, in fancy at 
least, until overwhelming reality shall render it no longer 
possible. I have said thus much, sir, in order that I 
may be understood as meeting the constitutional ques- 
tion as a mere question of interpretation, and as disdain- 
ing to press into the service of my argument upon it, 
prophetic fears of any sort, however they may be coun- 
tenanced by an avowal, formidable by reason of the high 
reputation of the individual by whom it has been haz- 
arded, of sentiments the most distinctive, which, if not 
borrowed from, are identical with, the worst visions of 
the political doctrines of France, when all the elements 
of discord and misrule were let loose upon that devoted 
nation. I mean " the infinite perfectibility of man and 
his institutions," and the resolution of everything into 
a state of nature. I have another motive which, at the 
risk of being misconstrued, I will declare without re- 
16* 



194 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

serve. With my convictions, and with ray feelings, I 
never will consent to hold confederated America bound 
together by a silken cord, which any instrument of mis- 
chief may sever, to the view of monarchical foreigners, 
who look with a jealous eye upon that glorious experi- 
ment Miich is now in progress amongst us in favor of 
republican freedom. Let them make such prophesies 
as they will, and nourish such feelings as they-may, I 
will not contribute to the fulfillment of the former, nor 
minister to the gratification of the latter. Sir, it was 
but the other day that we were forbidden (properly for- 
bidden, I am sure, for the } rohibition came from you) 
to assume that there existed any intention to impose a 
prospective restraint on the domestic legislation of Mis- 
souri — a restraint to act upon it contemporaneously with 
its origin as a state, and to continue adhesive to it 
through all the stages of its political existence. We 
are now, however, permitted to know that it is deter- 
mined, by a sort of political surgery, to amputate one 
of the limbs of its local sovereignty, and thus mangled 
and disparaged, and thus only, to receive it into the 
bosom of the Constitution. It is now avowed that, 
while Maine is to be ushered into the Union with every 
possible demonstration of studious reverence on our 
part, and on hers with colors flying, and all the other 
graceful accompaniments of honorable triumph, this 
ill-conditioned upstart of the West, this obscure found- 
ling of a wilderness that was but yesterday the hunting- 
ground of the savage, is to find her way into the Amer- 
ican family as she can, with an humiliated badge of 
remediless inferiority patched upon her garments, with 
the mark of recent qualified manumission upon her, or 
ratner with a brand uponher forehead to tell the story 
of her territorial vassalage, and to perpetuate the mem- 
ory of her evil propensities. It is now avowed that 



WILLIAM PLNKNEY. 195 

while the robust district of Maine is to be seated by the 
side of her truly respectable parent, co-ordinate in au- 
thority and honor, and is to be dandled into power and 
dignity, of which she does not stand in need, but which 
undoubtedly she deserves, the more infantine and feeble 
Missouri is to be repelled with harshness, and forbidden 
to come at all, unless with the iron collar of servitude 
about her neck, instead of the civic crown of republican 
freedom upon her brow, and is to be doomed forever to 
leading strings, unless she will exchange those leading 
strings for shackles. 

I am told that you have the power to establish this 
odious and revolting distinction, and I am referred for 
the proofs of that power to Tarious parts of the Consti- 
tution, but principally to that part of it which author- 
izes the admission of new states into the Union. I am 
myself of opinion that it is in that part only that the 
advocates for this restriction can, with any hope of suc- 
cess, apply for a license to impose it ; and that the efforts 
which have been made to find it in other portions of 
that instrument are too desperate to require to be en- 
countered. I shall, however, examine those other por- 
tions before I have done, lest it should be supposed by 
those who have relied upon them, that I omit to answer 
what I believe to be unanswerable. The clause of the 
Constitution which relates to the admission of new states 
is in these words : " The Congress may admit new states 
into this Union," etc., and the advocates for restriction 
maintain that the use of the word " may" imports dis- 
cretion to admit or to reject; and that in this discretion 
is wrapped up another — that of prescribing the terms 
and conditions of admission in case you are willing to 
admit : Cvjus est dare ejus est disponere. I will not, 
for the present, inquire whether this involved discretion 
to dictate the terms of admission belongs to you or not 



196 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

It is fit that I should first look to the nature and extent 
of it. 

I think I may assume that if such a power be any- 
thing but nominal, it is much more than adequate to 
the present object; that it is a power of vast expansion, 
to which human sagacity can assign no reasonable lim- 
its; that it is a capacious reservoir of authority, from 
which you may take, in all time to come, as occasion 
may serve, the means of oppression as well as of bene- 
faction. I know that it professes at this moment to be 
the chosen instrument of protecting mercy, and would 
win upon us by its benignant smiles ; but I know, too, 
it can frown and play the tyrant, if it be so disposed. 
Notwithstanding the softness which it now assumes, and 
the care with which it conceals its giant proportions 
beneath the deceitful drapery of sentiment, when it 
next appears before you, it may show itself with a 
sterner countenance and in more awful dimensions. It 
is, to speak the truth, sir, a power of colossal size — if, 
indeed, it be not an abuse of language to call it by the 
gentle name of upoiver. Sir, it is a wilderness of pow- 
ers, of which Fancy, in her happiest mood, is unable to 
perceive the far- distant and shadowy boundary. Armed 
with such a power, with religion in one hand and phi- 
lanthropy in the other, and followed with a goodly train 
of public and private virtues, you may achieve more 
conquests over sovereignties not your own, than falls to 
the common lot of even uncommon ambition. By the 
aid of such a power, skilfully employed, you may 
" bridge your way " over the Hellespont that separates 
State legislature from that of Congress ; and you may 
do so for pretty much the same purpose with which 
Xerxes once bridged his way across the Hellespont that 
separates Asia from Europe. He did so, in the language 
of Milton, " the liberties of Greece to yoke." 



WILLIAM PLNKNEY. 



197 



You may do so for the analogous purpose of subju- 
gating and reducing the sovereignties of States, as your 
taste or convenience may suggest, and fashioning them 
to your imperial will. There are those in this house 
who appear to think, and I doubt not sincerely, that the 
particular restraint now under consideration, is wise 
and benevolent, and good : wise as respects the Union — 
good as respects Missouri — benevolent as respects the 
unhappy victims whom, with a novel kindness, it would 
incarcerate in the South, and bless by decay and extir- 
pation. Let all such beware, lest in their desire for the 
effect which they believe the restriction will produce, 
they are too easily satisfied that they have the right to 
impose it. The moral beauty of the present purpose, or 
even its political recommendations (whatever they may 
be), can do nothing for a power like this, which claims 
to prescribe conditions ad libitum, and to be competent 
to this purpose, because it is competent to all. This re- 
striction, if it be not smothered in its birth, will be but 
a small part of the progeny of that prolific power. It 
teems with a mighty brood, of which this may be en- 
titled to the distinction of comeliness as well as of primo- 
geniture. The rest may want the boasted loveliness of 
their predecessors, and be even uglier than " Lapland 
witches." 

Perhaps, sir, you will permit me to remind you that 
it is almost always in company with those considerations 
which interest the heart, in some way or other, that en- 
croachment steals into the world. A bad purpose throws 
no veil over the licenses of power. It leaves them to be 
seen as they are. It affords them no protection from 
the inquiring eye of Jealousy. The danger is when a 
tremendous discretion, like the present, is attempted to 
be assumed, as on this occasion, in the names of Pity, 
of Eeligion, of national Honor and national Prosperity; 



198 WILLIAM PLNKNEY. 

when encroachment tucks itself out in the robes of 
piety, or humanity, or addresses itself to pride of coun- 
try, with all its kindred passions and motives. It is 
then that the guardians of the Constitution are apt to 
slumber on their watch, or, if awake, to mistake for 
lawful rule some pernicious arrogation of power. I 
would not discourage authorized legislation upon those 
kindly, generous and noble feelings which Providence 
has given to us for the best of purposes, but when power 
to act is under discussion, I will not look to the end in 
view, lest I should become indifferent to the lawfulness 
of the means. Let us discard from this high constitu- 
tional question all those extrinsic considerations which 
have been forced into its discussion. Let us endeavor 
to approach it with a philosophic impartiality of temper 
— with a sincere desire to ascertain the boundaries of 
our authority, and a determination to keep our wishes 
in subjection to our allegiance to the Constitution. 
Slavery, we are told in many a pamphlet, memorial and 
speech, with which the press has lately groaned, is a 
foul blot upon our otherwise immaculate reputation. 
Let this be conceded, yet you are no nearer than before 
to the conclusion that you possess power which may 
deal with other subjects as effectually as with this. 
Slavery, we are further told, with some pomp of meta- 
phor, is a canker at the root of all that is excellent in this 
^Republican Empire, a pestilent disease that is snatch- 
ing the youthful bloom from its cheek, prostrating its 
honor, and withering its strength. Be it so ; yet it you 
have power to medicine to it in the way proposed, and 
in virtue of the diploma which you claim, you have also 
power in the distribution of your political alexipharmics ; 
to present the deadliest drugs to every territory that 
would become a state, and bid it drink or remain a 
colony forever. Slavery, we are also told, is now "roll- 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 199 

ing onward, with a rapid tide, toward the boundless 
regions of the West," threatening to doom them to 
sterility and sorrow, unless some potent voice can say to 
it, thus far shalt thou go and no farther. 

Slavery engenders pride and indolence in him who 
commands, and inflicts intellectual and moral degrada- 
tion on him who serves Slavery, in fine, is unchristian 
and abominable. Sir, I shall not stop to deny that 
slavery is all this and more ; but I shall not think myself 
the less authorized to deny that it is for you to stay the 
course of this dark torrent, by opposing to it a mound 
raised up by the labors of this portentous discretion on 
the domain of others — a mound which you cannot erect 
but through the instrumentality of a trespass of no or- 
dinary kind — not the comparatively innocent trespass 
that beats down a few blades of grass which the first 
kind sun or the next refreshing shower may cause to 
spring again, but that which levels with the ground the 
lordliest trees of the forest, and claims immortality for 
the destruction which it inflicts. I shall not, I am sure, 
be told that I exaggerate this pow T er. It has been ad- 
mitted here, and elsewhere, that I do not. But I want 
no such concession. It is manifest, that as a discretion- 
ary power, it is everything or nothing — that its head is 
in the clouds, or that it is a mere figment of enthusiastic 
speculation — that it has no existence, or that it is an 
alarming vortex ready to swallow up all such portions 
of the sovereignty of an infant state, as you may think 
fit to cast into it as preparatory to the introduction into 
the Union of the miserable residue. 

No man can contradict me when I say, that if you 
have this power, you may squeeze down a new-born sov- 
ereign state to the size of a pigmy, and then taking it 
between finger and thumb, stick it into some niche of 
the Union, and still continue, by way of mockery, to 



200 WILLIAM PLNKNEY. 

call it a state in the sense of the Constitution. You may- 
waste it to a shadow, and then introduce it into the 
society of flesh and blood, an object of scorn and derision. 
You may sweat and reduce it to a thing of skin and 
bone, and then place the ominous skeleton beside the 
ruddy and healthful members of the Union, that it may 
have leisure to mourn the lamentable difference between 
itself and its companions, and to brood over its disas- 
trous promotion, and to seek in justifiable discontent, 
an opportunity for separation, and insurrection, and re- 
bellion. What may you not do by dexterity and perse- 
verance with this terrific power ? You may give to a 
new state, in the form of terms which it cannot refuse 
(as I shall show you hereafter), a statute-book of a 
thousand volumes — providing not for ordinary cases 
only, but even for possibilities ; you may lay the yoke, 
no matter whether light or heavy, upon the necks of the 
latest posterity ; you may send this searching power into 
every hamlet for centuries to come, by laws enacted in 
the spirit of prophecy, and regulating all those dear re- 
lations of domestic concern, which belong to local leg- 
islation, and which even local legislation touches with a 
delicate and sparing hand. This is the first inroad. 
But will it be the last ? This provision is but a pioneer 
for others of a more desolating aspect. It is the fatal 
bridge of which Milton speaks, and when once firmly 
built, what shall hinder you to pass it when you please, 
for the purpose of plundering power after power at the 
expense of new states, as you will still continue to call 
them, and raising up prospective codes, irrevocable and 
immortal, which shall leave to those states the empty 
shadows of domestic sovereignty, and convert them into 
petty pageants, in themselves contemptible, but rendered 
infinitely more so by the contrast of their humble facul- 
ties, with the proud and admitted pretensions of those, 






WILLIAM PINKNEY. 201 

who, having doomed them to the inferiority of vassals, 
have condescended to take them into their society and 
under their protection ! I shall be told, perhaps, that 
you can have no temptation to do all, or any part of 
this, and moreover, that you can do nothing of your- 
selves, or, in other words, without the concurrence of 
the new State. The last of these suggestions I shall 
examine by and by. To the first I answer, that it is not 
incumbent upon me to prove that this discretion will be 
abused. It is enough for me to prove the vastness of 
the power as an inducement to make us pause upon it, 
and to inquire with attention, whether there is any 
apartment in the Constitution large enough to give it 
entertainment. It is more than enough for me to show 
that vast as is this power, it is with reference to mere 
territories an irresjjonsible power. Power is irresponsi- 
ble when it acts upon those who are defenceless against 
it, who cannot check it, or contribute to check it, in its 
exercise, who can resist it only by force. The territory 
of Missouri has no check upon this power. It has no 
share in the government of the Union. In this body it 
has no representative. In the other House it has, by 
courtesy, an agent, who may remonstrate, but cannot 
vote. That such an irresponsible power is not likely 
to be abused, who will undertake to assert ? If it is 
not, "Experience is a cheat, and Fact a liar." The 
power which England claimed over the colonies was 
such a power, and it was abused, and hence the Revo- 
lution. Such a power is always perilous to those who 
wield it, as well as to those on whom it is exerted. 
Oppression is but another name for irresponsible power, 
if history is to be trusted. The free spirit of our Con- 
stitution and of our people is no assurance against the 
propension of unbridled power to abuse, when it acts 
upon colonial dependents rather than upon ourselves. 
17 



202 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

Free States, as well as despots, have oppressed those 
whom they were hound to foster — and it is the nature 
of man that it should he so. The love of power and the 
desire to display it when it can he done with impunity? 
is inherent in the human heart. Turn it out at the 
door, and it will in again at the window. Power is dis- 
played in its fullest measure, and with a captivating 
dignity, by restraints and conditions. The pruritas 
leges ferendi is an universal disease, and conditions are 
laws as far as they go. The vanity of human wisdom 
and the presumption of human reason are proverbial 
This vanity and this presumption are often neither 
reasonable nor wise. Humanity, too, sometimes plays 
fantastic tricks with power. Time, moreover, is fruit- 
ful in temptations to convert discretionary power to all 
sorts of purposes. 

Time, that withers the strength of man and " strews 
around him like autumn leaves the ruins of his proud- 
est monuments," produces great vicissitudes in modes 
of thinking and feeling. It brings along with it, in its 
progress, new circumstances, new combinations and 
modifications of the old, generating new views, motives, 
and caprices, new fanaticisms of endless variety — in 
short, new everything. We ourselves are always chang- 
ing, and what to-day we have but a small desire to 
attempt, to-morrow becomes the object of our passion- 
ate aspirations. There is such a thing as enthusiasm, 
moral, religious or political, or a compound of all three, 
and it is wonderful what it will attempt, and from what 
imperceptible beginnings it sometimes rises into a 
mighty agent. Rising from some obscure or unknown 
source, it first shows itself a petty rivulet, which 
scarcely murmurs over the pebbles that obstruct its 
way — then it swells into a fierce torrent, bearing all 
before it — and then again, like some mountain stream, 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 203 

which occasional rains haye precipitated upon the 
valley, it sinks once more into a rivulet, and finally 
leaves its channels dry. Such a thing has happened. 
I do not say that it is now happening. It would not 
become me to say so ; but if it should occur, woe to the 
unlucky territory that should be struggling to make its 
way into the Union at the moment when the opposing 
inundation was at its height, and at the same instant, 
this wide Mediterranean of discretionary powers, which 
it seems is ours, should open all its sluices, and with a 
consentaneous rush, mingle with the turbid waters of 
the others. 

"New states may he admitted by the Congress into 
this Union." It is objected that the word "may" 
imports power, not obligation — a right to decide — a 
discretion to grant or refuse. To this it might be 
answered, that power is duty on many occasions. But 
let it be conceded that it is discretionary. What con- 
sequence follows ? A power to refuse, in a case like 
this, does not necessarily involve a power to exact 
terms. You must look to the result, which is the 
declared object of the power. Whether you will arrive 
at it or not, may depend on your will ; but you cannot 
compromise with the result intended and professed. 
What then is the professed result ? To admit a state 
into this Union. What is that Union? A confedera- 
tion of states, equal in sovereignty — capable of every- 
thing which the Constitution does not forbid, or 
authorize Congress to forbid. It is an equal Union 
between parties equally sovereign. They were sover- 
eign, independently of the Union. The object of the 
Union was common protection for the exercise of 
already existing sovereignty. The parties gave up a 
portion of that sovereignty to insure the remainder. 



204 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

As far as they gave it up, by the common compact, 
they have ceased to be sovereign. The Union provides 
the means of defending the residue ; and it is into that 
Union that a new State is placed on the same footing 
with the original states. 

It accedes for the same purpose, i. e., protection for 
its unsurrendered sovereignty. 

If it comes in shorn of its beams, crippled and dis- 
paraged beyond the original states, it is not into the 
original Union that it comes. For it is a different sort 
of Union. The first was Union inter pares. This is a 
Union between disparates — between giants and a dwarf 
— between power and feebleness — between full propor- 
tioned sovereignties and a miserable image of power — a 
thing which that very Union has shrunk and shrivelled 
from its just size, instead of preserving it in its true 
dimensions. It is into " this Union, i. e., the Union of 
the Federal Constitution, that you are to admit or re- 
fuse to admit. You can admit into no other. You 
cannot make Union, as to the new state, what it is not 
as to the old ; for then it is not this Union that you 
open for the entrance of a new party. If you make it 
enter into a new and additional compact, is it any 
longer the same Union ? We are told that admitting a 
state into the Union is a compact; yes, but what sort of 
a compact ? A compact that it shall be a member of 
the Union, as the Constitution has made it. You can- 
not new fashion it. You may make a compact to 
admit, but when admitted, the original compact pre- 
vails. The Union is a compact, with a provision of 
political power and agents for the accomplishment of 
its objects. Vary that compact as to a new state; 
give new energy to that political power, as to make it 
act with more force upon a new state than upon the 
old; make the will of those agents more effectually the 









WILLIAM PINKNEY, 205 

arbiter of the fate of a new state than of the old, and it 
may be confidently said that the new state has not 
entered into this Union, but into another Union. How 
far the Union has been varied is another question. 

But that it has been varied is clear. If I am told, 
that by the bill relative to Missouri, you do not legislate 
upon a new state, I answer that you do ; and I answer 
further, that it is immaterial whether you do or not. 
.But it is upon Missouri, as a state, that your terms and 
conditions are to act. Until Missouri is a state, the 
terms and conditions are nothing. You legislate in the 
shape of terms and conditions prospectively, and you so 
legislate upon it, tha\, when it comes into the Union, it 
is to be bound by a contract degrading and diminishing 
its sovereignty, and is to be stripped of rights which 
the original parties to the Union did not consent to 
abandon, and which that Union (so far as depends upon 
it) takes under its protection and guarantee. Is the 
right to hold slaves a right which Massachusetts enjoys ? 
If it is, Massachusetts is under this Union in a different 
character from Missouri. The compact of Union for it 
is different from the same compact of Union for Mis- 
souri. The power of Congress is different — everything 
which depends upon the Union is, in that respect, differ- 
ent. But it is immaterial whether you legislate for 
Missouri as a state or not. The effect of your legisla- 
tion is to bring it into the Union with a portion of its 
sovereignty taken away. But it is a State which you are 
to admit. What is a state in the sense of the Constitu- 
tion ? It is not a state in the general, but a state as 
yon find it in the Constitution. A state, generally, is 
a body politic or independent political society of men. 
But the state which you are to admit, must be more or 
less than this political entity. What must it be ? Ask 
the Constitution. It shows what it means by a state, 



206 AVILLIAM P1NKNEY. 

by reference to the parties to it. It must be such a 
state as Massachusetts, Virginia, and the other members 
of the American Confederacy — a state with full sover- 
eignty, except as the Constitution restricts it. It is 
said that the word may necessarily implies the right of 
prescribing the terms of admission. Those who main- 
tain this are aware that there are no express words (such 
as upon such terms and conditions as Congress shall think 
Jit) words which it was natural to expect to find in the 
Constitution, if the effect contended for were meant. 
They put it, therefore, on the word may, and on that 
alone. Give to that word all the force you please, what 
does it import ? That Congress is not bound to admit 
a new State into this Union. 

Be it so, for argument's sake. Does it follow that 
when you consent to admit into this Union a new state, 
you can make it less in sovereign power than the original 
parties to that Union ; that you can make the Union as 
to it what it is not as to them; that you can fashion it 
to your liking by compelling it to purchase admission 
into an Union by sacrificing a portion of that power 
which it is the sole purpose of the Union to maintain 
in all the plenitude which the Union itself does not im- 
pair? Does it follow that you can force upon it an ad- 
ditional compact not found in the compact of Union ? 
That you can make it come into the Union less a state, 
in regard to sovereign power, than its fellows in that 
Union ? That you can cripple its legislative competency 
(beyond the Constitution, which is the pact of Union, 
to which you make it a party as if it had been originally 
a party to it), by what you choose to call a condition, 
but which, whatever it may be called, brings the new 
government into the Union under new obligations to it, 
and with disparaged power to be protected by it? In a 
word, the whole amount of the argument on the other 






WILLIAM PINKNEY. 207 

side is that you may refuse to admit a new state, and 
that, therefore, if you admit, you may prescribe the 
terms. The answer to that argument is, that even if 
you can refuse, you can prescribe no terms which are 
inconsistent with the act you are to do. You can pre- 
scribe no condition which, if carried into effect, would 
make the new state less a sovereign state than, under 
the Union as it stands, it would be. You can prescribe 
no terms which will make the compact of Union be- 
tween it and the origina 1 states essentially different from 
that compact among the original states. You may ad- 
mit, or refuse to admit; but if you admit, you must 
admit a state in the sense of the Constitution — a state 
witli all such sovereignty as belongs to the original par- 
ties; and it must be into this Union that you are to ad- 
mit it, not into a Union of your own dictating, formed 
out of the existing Union by qualifications and new 
compacts, altering its character and effects, and making 
fall short of its protecting energy in reference to the 
new state, whilst it acquires an energy of another sort, 
the energy of restraint and destruction. I have thus 
endeavored to show, that even if you have a discretion 
to refuse to admit, you have no discretion, if you are 
willing to admit, to insist upon any terms that impair 
the sovereignty of the admitted state, as it would other- 
wise stand in the Union by the Constitution which re- 
ceives it into its bosom. To admit or not, is for you to 
decide. Admission once conceded, it follows as a 
corollary that you must take the new state as an equal 
companion with its fellows ; that you cannot recast or 
new model the Union pro hac vice, but that you must 
receive it into the actual Union, and recognize it as a 
parcener in the common inheritance, without any other 
shackles than the rest have, by the Constitution, sub- 
mitted to bear, without any other extinction of power 



208 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

than is the work of the Constitution acting indiffer- 
ently upon all. 

I may be told, perhaps, that the restriction in this 
case is the act of Missouri itself; that your law is 
nothing without its consent, and derives its efficacy 
from that alone. I shall have a more suitable occasion 
to speak on this topic hereafter, when I come to consider 
the treaty which ceded Louisiana to the United States. 
But I will say a few words upon it now, of a more gen- 
eral application, than it will in that branch of the argu- 
ment be necessary to use. A territory cannot surrender 
to Congress by anticipation, the whole, or a part, of the 
sovereign power which by the Constitution of the Union 
will belong to it when it becomes a state and a member 
of the Union. Its consent is, therefore, nothing. It is 
in no situation to make this surrender. It is under the 
government of Congress; if it can barter away a part 
of its sovereignty, by anticipation, it can do so as to the 
whole. For where will you stop ? If it does not cease 
to be a state, in the sense of the Constitution, with only 
a certain portion of sovereign power, what other smaller 
portion will have that effect ? If you depart from the 
standard of the Constitution, i. e., the quantity of do- 
mestic sovereignty left in the first contracting states, 
and secured by the original compact of Union, where 
will you get another standard ? Consent is no standard, 
for consent may be gained to a surrender of all. No 
state or territory, in order to become a state, can alienate 
or surrender any portion of its sovereignty to the Union, 
or to a sister state, or to a foreign nation. It is under 
an incapacity to disqualify itself for all the purposes of 
government left to it in the Constitution, by stripping 
itself of attributes which arise from the natural equality 
of states, and which the Constitution recognizes, not 
only because it does not deny them, but presumes them 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 209 

to remain as they exist by the law of nature and nations. 
Inequality in the sovereignty of states is unnatural and 
repugnant to all the principles of law. Hence we find 
it laid down by the text-writers on public law, that 
"Nature has established a perfect equality of rights be- 
tween independent nations" and that "whatever the 
quality of a free sovereign nation gives to one, it gives 
to another." The Constitution of the United States 
proceeds upon the truth of this doctrine. It takes the 
states as it finds them, Free and Sovereign alike by 
Nature. It receives from them portions of their power 
for the general good, and provides for the exercise of it 
by organized political bodies. It diminishes the indi- 
vidual sovereignty of each, and transfers what it sub- 
tracts to the government which it creates ; it takes from 
all alike, and leaves them relatively to each other equal 
in sovereign power. The honorable gentleman from 
New York has put the Constitutional argument alto- 
gether upon the clause relative to admission of new states 
into the Union. He does not pretend that you can find 
the power to restrain, in any extent, elsewhere. It fol- 
lows that it is not a particular power to impose this 
restriction, but a power to impose restrictions ad libitum. 
It is competent to this, because it is competent to 
everything. But it denies that there can be any power 
in man to hold in slavery his fellow-creature, and 
argues, therefore, that the prohibition is no restraint 
at all since it does not interfere with the sovereign 
powers of Missouri. 

One of the most signal errors with which the argu- 
ment on the other side has abounded, is this of con- 
sidering the proposed restriction as if leveled at the 
introduction or establishment of slavery, and hence the 
vehement declaration, which among other things, has 



210 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

informed us that slavery originated in fraud or vio- 
lence. The truth is, that the restriction has no rela- 
tion, real or pretended, to the right of making slaves of 
those who are free, or of introducing slavery where it 
does not already exist. It applies to those who are 
admitted to be already slaves, and who (with their pos- 
terity) would continue to be slaves if they should 
r3main where they are at present; and to a place where 
slavery already exists by the local law. Their civil 
condition will not be altered by their removal from 
Virginia or Carolina to Missouri. They will not be 
more slaves than they now are. Their abode, indeed,' 
will be different, but their bondage the same. Their 
numbers may possibly be augmented by the diffusion, 
and I think they will. But this can only happen 
because their hardships will be mitigated, and their 
comforts increased. The checks to population which 
exist in the older states will be diminished. 

The restriction, therefore, does not prevent the estab- 
lishment of slavery, either with reference to persons or 
place; but simply inhibits the removal from place to 
place (the law in each being the same) of a slave or 
make his emancipation the consequence of that re- 
moval. It acts professedly merely on slavery as it 
exists, and thus acting restrains its present lawful 
effects. That slavery, like many other human institu- 
tions, originated in fraud or violence, may be conceded ; 
but, however, it originated, it is established among us, 
and no man seeks a further establishment of it by new 
importations of freemen to be converted into slaves. 
On the contrary, all are anxious to mitigate its evils by 
all the means within the reach of the appropriate au- 
thority, the domestic legislatures of the different states. 

It can be nothing to the purpose of this argument, 
therefore, as the gentlemen themselves have shaped it, 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 211 

to inquire what was the origin of slavery? What is it 
now, and who are they that endeavor to innovate upon 
what it now is (the advocates of this restriction who 
desire change by unconstitutional means, or its oppo- 
nents who desire to leave the whole matter to local 
regulation) are the only questions worthy of attention. 
Sir, if we too closely look to the rise and progress 
of long-sanctioned establishments and unquestioned 
rights, we may discover other subjects than that of 
slavery, with which fraud and violence may claim a 
fearful connection, and over which it may be our 
interest to throw the mantle of oblivion. What was 
the settlement of our ancestors in this country but an 
invasion of the rights of the barbarians who inhabited 
it? That settlement, with slight exception, was ef- 
fected by the slaughter of those who did no more than 
defend their native land against the intruders of 
Europe, or by unequal compacts and purchases, in 
which feebleness and ignorance had to deal with power 
and cunning. The savages who once built their huts 
where this proud capital, rising from its recent ashes, ex- 
emplifies the sovereignty of the American people, were 
swept away by the injustice of our fathers, and their 
domain usurped by force, or obtained by artifices yet 
more criminal. Our continent was full of those abo- 
riginal inhabitants. Where are they or their descend- 
ants ? Either " with years beyond the flood," or driven 
back by the swelling tide of our population from the 
borders of the Atlantic to the deserts of the West. 
You follow still the miserable remnants, and make con- 
tracts with them that seal their ruin. You purchase 
their lands, of which they know not the value, in order 
that you may sell them to advantage, increase 3 T our 
treasure and enlarge your empire. Yet further — you 
pursue as they retire ; and they must continue to retire, 



212 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

until the Pacific shall stay their retreat and compel 
them to pass away as a dream. Will yon recur to those 
scenes of various iniquity for any other purpose than to 
regret and lament them? AVill you pry into them 
with a view to shake and impair your rights of property 
and dominion ? But the broad denial of the sovereign 
right of Missouri, if it shall become a sovereign state, 
to recognize slavery by its laws, is rested upon a variety 
of grounds, all of which I will examine. 

It is an extraordinary fact that they who urge this 
denial with such ardent zeal, stop short of it in their 
conduct. There are now slaves in Missouri whom they 
do not insist upon delivering from their chains. Yet if 
it is not incompetent to sovereign power to continue 
slavery in Missouri, in respect of slaves who may yet be 
carried thither, show me the power that can continue it 
in respect of slaves who are there already. Missouri is 
out of the old limits of the Union, and beyond those 
limits, it is said, we can give no countenance to slavery, 
if we can countenance or tolerate it any where. It is 
plain, that there can be no slaves beyond the Mississippi 
at this moment, but in virtue of some power to make or 
keep them so. What sort of power was it that has made 
them so ? Sovereign power it could not be, according 
to the honorable gentlemen from Pennsylvania and New 
Hampshire :* and if sovereign power is unequal to such 
a purpose, less than sovereign power is yet more unequal 
to it. The laws of Spain and Prance could do nothing 
— the laws of the territorial government of Missouri 
could do nothing toward such a result, if it be a result 
which no laws, in other words, no sovereignty could ac- 
complish. The treaty of 1803 could do no more, in this 
view, than the laws of France, or Spain, or territorial 
government of Missouri. A treaty is an act of sovereign 

*Mr. Roberts, Mr. Lowrie, and Mr. Morrill. 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 213 

power, taking the shape" of a compact between the par- 
ties to it; and that which sovereign power cannot reach 
at all, it cannot reach by a treaty. Those who are now 
held in bondage, therefore, in Missouri, and their issue, 
are entitled to be free, if there be any truth in the doc- 
trine of the honorable gentlemen ; and if the proposed 
restriction leaves all such in slavery, it thus discredits 
the very foundation on which it reposes. To be incon- 
sistent is the fate of false principles — but this inconsist- 
ency is the more to be remarked, since it cannot be 
referred to mere considerations of policy, without ad- 
mitting that such considerations may be preferred 
(without a crime) to what is deemed a paramount and 
indispensable duty. It is here, too, that I must be per- 
mitted to observe, that the honorable gentlemen have 
taken great pains to show that this restriction is a mere 
work of supererogation by the principal argument on 
which they rest the proof of its propriety. Missouri, it 
is said, can have no power to do what the restriction 
would prevent. It would be void, therefore, without 
the restriction. Why, then, I ask, is the restriction 
insisted upon ? Eestraint implies that there is some- 
thing to be restrained. But the gentlemen justify the 
restraint by showing that there is nothing upon which, 
it can operate ! They demonstrate the wisdom and ne- 
cessity of restraint, by demonstrating that with or with- 
out restraint, the subject is in the same predicament. 
This is to combat with a man of straw, and to put fet- 
ters upon a shadow. 

The gentlemen must therefore abandon either their 
doctrine^ or their restriction, their argument or their 
object, for they are directly in conflict and reciprocally 
destroy each other. It is evident that they will not 
abandon their object, and of course, I must believe, that 
they hold their argument in as little real estimation as 
18 



214 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

I, myself, do. The gentlemen can scarcely be sincere 
believers in their own principle. They have apprehen- 
sions, which they endeavor to conceal, that Missouri, as 
a state, will have power to continue slavery within its 
limits ; and if they will not be offended, I will venture 
to compare them, in this particular, with the duelist in 
Sheridan's comedy of the Eivals, who, affecting to have 
no fears whatever of his adversary, is, nevertheless, care- 
ful to admonish Sir Lucius to hold him fast. Let us 
take it for granted, however, that they are in earnest in 
their doctrine, and that it is very necessary to impose 
what they prove to be an unnecessary restraint: how do 
they support that doctrine ? The honorable gentleman 
on the other side* has told us, as a proof of his great 
position (that man cannot enslave his fellow-man, in 
which is implied that all laws upholding slavery are 
absolute nullities), that the nations of antiquity, as well 
as of modern times, have concurred in laying down that 
position as incontrovertible. He refers us, in the first 
place, to the Roman law, in which he finds it laid down 
as a maxim : Jure naturali omnes homines ab initio liber i 
nascebantur. From the manner in which this maxim 
was pressed upon us, it would not have been conjectured 
that the honorable gentleman who used it had borrowed 
it from a slaveholding empire, and still less from a book 
of the Institutes of Justinian, which treats of slavery? 
and justifies and regulates it. Had he given us the 
context, we should have had the modifications of which 
the abstract doctrine was in the judgment of the Roman 
law susceptible. We should have had an explanation 
of the competency of that law to convert, whether just- 
ly or unjustly, freedom into servitude, and to maintain 
the right of a master to the service and obedience of his 
slave. The honorable gentleman might also have gone 

*Mr. Kine. 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. ZlO 

to Greece for a similar maxim and a similar commentary, 
speculative and practical. He next refers us to Magna 
Charta. I am confident that it contains no such maxim 
as the honorable gentleman thinks he has discovered in 
it. The great charter was extorted from John, and his 
feeble son and successor, by haughty slaveholding 
barons, who thought only of themselves and the Com- 
mons of England (then inconsiderable), whom they 
wished to enlist in their efforts against the Crown. 
There is not in it a single word which condemns civil 
slavery. Freemen only are the objects of its protecting 
care ; "Melius liber homo" is its phraseology. The serfs 
who were chained to the soil — the villains regardant 
and in gross — were left as it found them. All England 
was then full of slaves, whose posterity would, by law, 
remain slaves as with us, except only that the issue fol- 
lowed the condition of the father instead of the mother. 
The rule was "Partus sequitur patrem," a rule more 
favorable, undoubtedly, from the very precariousness of 
its application, to the gradual extinction of slavery, 
than ours, which has been drawn from the Roman law, 
and is of sure and unavoidable effect. 

Still less has the Petition of Right, presented to Charles 
I. by the Long Parliament, to do with the subject of 
civil slavery. It looked merely, as Magna Charta had 
not done before it, to freedom of England — and sought 
only to protect them agaist royal prerogative and the 
encroaching spirit of the Stewarts. 

As to the Bill of Rights, enacted by the Convention 
Parliament of 1688, it is almost a duplicate of the Peti- 
tion of Right, and arose out of the recollection of that 
political tyranny from which the nation had just 
escaped, and the recurrence of which it was intended 
to prevent. It contains no abstract principles. It 
deals only with the practical checks upon the power of 



216 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

the monarch, and in safeguards for institutions essen- 
tial to the preservation of the public liberty. That it 
was not designed to anathematize civil slavery may be 
taken for granted, since at that epoch and long after- 
ward the English government inundated its foreign 
plantations with slaves, and supplied other nations with 
them as merchandise, under the sanction of solemn 
treaties negotiated for that purpose. And here I can- 
not forbear to remark that we owe it to that same gov- 
ernment, when it stood toward us in the relation of 
parent to child, that involuntary servitude exists in our 
land, and that we are now deliberating whether the pre- 
rogative of correcting its evils belongs to the national 
or the state governments. In the early periods of our 
colonial history everything was done by the mother 
country to encourage the importation of slaves into 
North America, and the measures which were adopted 
by the colonial assemblies to prohibit it were uni- 
formly negatived by the Crown. It is not therefore 
our fault, nor the fault of our ancestors, that this 
calamity has been entailed upon us , and notwithstand- 
ing the ostentation with which the loitering abolition of 
the slave trade by the British Parliament has been 
vaunted, the principal consideration which at last recon- 
ciled it to that measure was, that by suitable care the 
slave population in their West India Islands (already 
fully stocked) might be kept up and even increased with- 
out the aid of importation. In a word, it was cold calcu- 
lations of interest, and not the suggestions of humanity 
or respect for the philanthropic principles of Mr. 
Wilberforce, which produced their tardy abandonment 
of that abominable traffic. 

Of the Declaration of our Independence, which has 
also been quoted in support of the perilous doctrines 
now urged upon us, I need not now speak at large. I 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 217 

have shown on a former occasion how idle it is to rely 
upon that instrument for such a purpose, and will not 
fatigue you by mere repetition. The self-evident truths 
announced in the Declaration of Independence are not 
truths at all, if taken literally ; and the practical con- 
clusion contained in the same passage of that Declara- 
tion prove that they were never designed to be so 
received. The Articles of Confederation contain noth- 
ing on the subject, whilst the actual Constitution recog- 
nizes the legal existence of slavery by various provisions. 
• The power of prohibiting the slave trade is involved in 
that of regulating commerce, but this is coupled with 
an express inhibition to the exercise of it for twenty 
years. How then can that Constitution, which ex- 
pressly permits the importation of slaves, authorize the 
national government to set on foot a crusade against 
slavery? The clause respecting fugitive slaves is 
affirmative and active in its effects. It is a direct sanc- 
tion and positive protection of the right of the master 
to the services of his slave as derived under the local 
laws of the state. The phraseology in which it is 
wrapped still leaves the intention clear, and the words 
"persons held to service or labor in one state under 
the laws thereof " have always been interpreted to ex- 
tend to the case of slaves in the various acts of Con- 
Igress which have been passed to give efficacy to the 
provision, and in the judicial application of those laws. 
So also in the clause prescribing the ratio of repre- 
sentation — the phrase, " three-fifths of all other per- 
sons," is equivalent to slaves, or it means nothing. 
And yet we are told that those who are acting under a 
Constitution which sanctions the existence of slavery 
in those states which choose to tolerate it, are at liberty 
to hold that no law can sanction its existence ! It is idle 
to make the rightfulness of an act the measure of sover- 
18* 



218 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

eign power. The distinction between sovereign power 
and the moral right to exercise it has always been recog- 
nized. All political power may be abused, but is it to 
stop where abuse may begin ? The power of declaring 
war is a power of vast capacity for mischief, and 
capable of inflicting the most wide-spread desolation 
but it is given to Congress without stint and without 
measure. Is a citizen, or are the courts of justice to 
inquire whether that, or any other law, is just before 
they obey or execute it ? And are there any degrees 
of injustice which will withdraw from sovereign power 
the capacity of making a given law? But sovereignty 
is said to be deputed power. Deputed— by whom ? By 
the people, because the power is theirs. And if it be 
theirs, does not the restriction take it away ? Examine 
the Constitution of the Union, and it will be seen that 
the people of the Slates are regarded as well as the 
states themselves. The Constitution was made by the 
people, and ratified by the people. Is it fit, then, that 
all the sovereignty of a state is in the government of 
the state ? So much is there as the people grant ; and 
the people can take it away, or give more, or new model 
what they have already granted. It is this right which 
the proposed restriction takes from Missouri. You 
give them an immortal constitution depending on your 
will, not on theirs. The people and their posterity are 
to be bound for ever by this restriction ; and upon the 
same principle any other restriction may be imposed. 
Where then is their power to change the Constitution 
and to devolve new sovereignty upon the state govern- 
ment ? You limit their sovereign capacity to do it ; 
and when you talk of a state, you mean the people as 
well as the government. The people are the source of 
all power — you dry up that source. They are the reser 
voir — you take out of it what suits you. 






WILLIAM PINKNEY. 219 

But if a republican form of government is that in 
which all the men have a share in the public power, 
the slave-holding states will not alone retire from the 
Union. The constitutions of some of the other states 
do not sanction universal suffrage, or universal eligi- 
bility. They require citizenship, and age, and a certain 
amount of property, to give a title to vote or to be voted 
for; and they who have not those qualifications are just 
as much disfranchised with regard to the government 
as if they were slaves. They have civil rights indeed 
(and so have slaves in a less degree), but they have no 
share in the government. Their provinc3 is to obey 
the laws, not to assist in making them. All such states 
must therefore be forisfamiliated with Virginia and the 
rest, or change their systen ; for the Constitution, being 
absolutely silent on those subjects, will afford them no 
protection. The Union might thus be reduced from an 
union to a unit. Who does not see that such conclu- 
sions flow from false notions; that the true theory of a 
republican government is mistaken, and that in such a 
government rights, political and civil, may be qualified 
by the fundamental law upon such inducements as the 
freemen of the country deem sufficient? That civil 
rights may be qualified as well as political is proved by 
a thousand examples. Minors, resident aliens, who are 
in a course of naturalization — -the other sex, whether 
maids, or wives, or widows, furnish sufficient practical 
proofs of this. Again, if we are to entertain these 
hopeful abstractions, and to resolve all establishments 
into their imaginary elements in order to recast them 
upon some Utopian* plan, and if it be true that all the 
men in a republican government must help to wield its 
power, and be equal in rights, I beg leave to ask the 
honorable gentleman from New Hampshire — and why 
not all the women f They too are God's creatures, and 



220 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

not only very fair but very rational creatures ; and our 
great ancestor, if we are to give credit to Milton, ac- 
counted them the "wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, 
best;" although to say the truth he had but one 
specimen from which to draw his conclusion, and pos- 
sibly if he had had more, would not have drawn it at 
all. They have, moreover, acknowledged civil rights in 
abundance, and upon abstract principles more than 
their masculine rulers allow them in fact. Some mon- 
archies, too, do not exclude them from the throne. 

We have all read of Elizabeth of England, of Catha- 
rine of Russia, of Semiramis and Zenobia, and a long 
list of royal and imperial dames, about as good as an 
equal list of royal and imperial lords. Why is it that 
their exclusion from the power of a popular government 
is not destructive of its republican character ? I do not 
address this question to the honorable gentleman's gal- 
lantry, but to his abstraction and his theories, and his 
notions of the infinite perfectibility of human institu- 
tions, borrowed from Godwin and the turbulent philoso- 
phers of France. For my own part, sir, if I may have 
leave to say so much in this mixed uncommon audience, 
I confess I am no friend to female government, unless, 
indeed, it be that which reposes on gentleness, and 
modesty, and virtue, and feminine grace and delicacy ; 
and how powerful a government that is, we have all of 
us, as I suspect, at some time or other experienced ! But 
if the ultra-republican doctrines which have now been 
broached, should ever gain ground among us, I should 
not be surprised if some romantic reformer, treading in 
the footsteps of Mrs. Wols ton craft, should propose to 
repeal our republican law salique, and claim for our 
wives and daughters a full participation in political 
power, and to add to it that domestic power which in 
some families, as I have heard, is as absolute and unre- 
publican as any power can be. 



william pinkney. 221 

Extracts from a Pamphlet Written by Mr. Pink- 

ney to the People of Maryland, over the 

Name of "Publius." 

"Maryland is at all times an interesting and con- 
spicuous member of the Union ; but her relative posi- 
tion is infinitely more important now than in ordinary 
seasons. The war is in her waters, and it is waged there 
with a wantonness of brutality which will not suffer the 
energies of her gallant population to slumber, or the 
watchfulness of her appointed guardians to be inter- 
mitted. The rights for which the Nation is in arms 
are of high import to her as a commercial section of 
the Continent. They cannot be surrendered or compro- 
mised without affecting every vein and artery of her 
system; and if the towering honor of universal America 
should be made to bow before the sword, or should be 
betrayed by an inglorious peace, where will the blow be 
felt with a sensibility more exquisite than here in Mary- 
land! 

" It is perfectly true that our State Government has 
not the prerogative of peace and war ; but it is just as 
true that it can do much to invigorate or enfeeble the 
National arm for attack or defence ; that it may conspire 
with the legislatures of other states to blast the best 
hopes of peace, by embarrassing or resisting the efforts 
by which alone a durable peace can be achieved ; as it 
may forward pacific negotiation by contributing to teach 
the enemy that we who, when our means were small 
and our numbers few, rose as one man and maintained 
ourselves victorious against the mere theories of Eng- 
land, with all the terrors of English power before us, 
are not noiv prepared to crouch to less than the same 
power, however insolently displayed, and to receive from 
it in perpetuity an infamous yoke of pernicious princi- 
ples which had already galled us until we could bear it 
no longer. 



222 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

" ' Nothing is more to be esteemed than peace/ (I 
quote the wisdom of Polybius), 'when it leaves us in 
possession of our honor and rights; hut when it is 
joined with loss of freedom, or with infamy, nothing 
can be more detestable and fatal.' I speak with just 
confidence, when I say, that no federalist can be found 
who desires with more sincerity the return of peace 
than the republican by which the war was declared. 
But it desires such a peace as the companion and in- 
structor of Scipio has praised — a peace consistent with 
our rights and honor, and not the deadly tranquility 
which may be purchased by disgrace, or taken in barter 
for the dearest and most essential claims of our trade 
and sovereignty. I appeal to you boldly: Are you pre- 
pared to purchase a mere cessation of arms by unquali- 
fied submission to the pretensions of England? Are 
you prepared to sanction them by treaty, and entail them 
upon your posterity, with the inglorious and timid hope 
of escaping the wrath of those whom your fathers dis- 
comfited and vanquished ? Are you prepared, for the 
sake of present profit, which the circumstances of 
Europe must render paltry and precarious, to cripple 
the strong wing of American commerce for years to 
come, to take from our Flag its national effect and char- 
acter, and to subject our vessels on the high seas, and 
the brave men who navigate them, to the municipal ju- 
risdiction of Great Britain ? I know very well that there 
are those amongst us (I hope they are few) who are pre- 
pared for all this and more; who pule over every scratch 
occasioned by the war, as if it were an overwhelming 
calamity, and are only sorry that it is not worse ; who 
would skulk out of a contest for the best interests of 
their country to save a shilling or gain a cent; who, 
having inherited the wealth of their ancestors without 
their spirit, would receive laws from London with as 



WILLIAM PINKNEY. 223 

much facility as woolens from Yorkshire, or hardware 
from Sheffield. But I write to the great body of the 
people, who are sound and virtuous, and worthy of the 
legacy which the heroes of the Revolution have be- 
queathed them. For them, I undertake to answer, that 
the only peace which they can be made to endure is 
that which may twine itself round the honor of the 
people, and with its healthy and abundant foliage give 
shade and shelter to the prosperity of the empire. 

" The approach of a British cruiser, in the bosom of 
peace, struck a terror in our seamen which it cannot 
noiv inspire, and almost every vessel returning from a 
foreign voyage brought affliction to an American family 
by reporting the impressment of a husband, a brother, 
or a son. The Government of the United States, by 
whomsoever administered, has invariably protested 
against this monstrous practice as cruel to the gallant 
men whom it oppressed, as it was injurious to the navi- 
gation, the commerce, and the sovereignty of the Union. 
Under the administration of Washington, of Adams, of 
Jefferson, of Madison, it was reprobated and resisted as 
a grievance which could not be borne ; and Mr. King, 
who was instructed upon it, supposed at one time that 
the British Government were ready to abandon it by a 
convention which he had arranged with Lord St. Vin- 
cent, but which finally miscarried. You have witnessed 
the generous anxiety of the late and present chief Mag- 
istrates to put an end to a usage so pestilent and de- 
basing. 

" You have seen them propose to a succession of Eng- 
lish ministers, as inducements to its relinquishment, 
expedients and equivalents of infinitely greater value to 
England than the usage, whilst they were innocent in 
themselves and respectful to us. Y^ou have seen these 
temperate overtures haughtily repelled, until the other 



224 WILLIAM PINKNEY. 

noxious pretensions of Great Britain, grown in the in- 
terim to a gigantic size, ranged themselves by the side of 
this, and left no alternative but war or infamy. 

" We are at war accordingly, and the single question is, 
whether you will fly like cowards from the sacred ground 
which the government has been compelled to take, or 
whether you will prove by your actions that you are de- 
scended from the loins of men who reared the edifice of 
American liberty, in the midst of such a storm as you 
have never felt. 

"As the war was forced upon us by a long series of un- 
exampled aggressions, it would be absolute madness to 
doubt that Peace will receive a cordial welcome, if she 
returns without ignominy in her train, and with security 
in her hand. The destinies of America are commercial, 
and her true policy is peace ; but the substance of peace 
had, long before we were roused to a tardy resistance, 
been denied to us by the ministry of England ; and the 
shadow which had been left to mock our hopes and to 
delude our imaginations, resembled too much the frown- 
ing spectre of war to deceive any body. Every sea had 
witnessed, and continued to witness, the systematic per- 
secution of our trade and the unrelenting oppression of 
our people. The ocean had ceased to be the safe high- 
way of the neutral world; and our citizens traversed it 
with all the fears of a benighted-traveler, who trembles 
along a road beset with oandiiti, or infested by the 
beasts of the forest. The Government, thus urged and 
goaded, drew the sword with a visible reluctance, and 
true to the pacific policy which kept it so long in the 
scabbard, will sheathe it again when Great Britain 
shall consult her own interest by consenting to forbear 
in future the wrongs of the past. 

" The disposition of the government upon that point 
has been decidedly pronounced by facts which need no 






WILLIAM PINKNEY. 225 

commentary. From the moment when war was de- 
clared, peace has been sought hy it with a steady and 
unwearied assiduity, at the same time that every practi- 
cable preparation has been made, and every nerve ex- 
erted to prosecute the war with vigor, if the enemy 
should persist in his injustice. The law respecting 
seamen, the Kussian Mission, the instructions sent to 
our Gharge-d' '-affaires in London, the prompt and ex- 
plicit disavowal of every unreasonable pretension falsely 
ascribed to us, and the solemn declaration of the gov- 
ernment in the face of the world, that it wishes for 
nothing more than a fair and honorable accommoda- 
tion, would be conclusive proofs of this, if any proofs 
were necessary. But it does not require to be proved, 
because it is self-evident." 




THE PIRATE'S SONG. 



LET us climb the lofty billows, 
The tempest let us dare, 
On ocean be our dwelling, 

Our warlike bark is yare. 
The blood-red flag is floating 

Upon the wakened breeze , 
We claim beneath its menace 

Dominion of the seas! 
What though we have not treasure ? 

Our bright swords will supply 
The power, the joys, the splendor 

That coward slaves must buy. 
Our voice shall not be humble, 

Our eyes shall have no tear, 
What others seek as favor 

Is yielded us from fear ; 
And those who scorned us suing, 

And smiled upon our hate, 
Will kneel to us for mercy, 

And know our word their fate. 
Our passions shall be choosers 

Midst joys before denied, 
Our will alone shall gaide us. 

All rule of law defied ; 
For us the patient labor, 

No other toil have we, 
Than gathering others' earnings, 

To roam the dark blue sea. 
The shipwreck and the battle 

May daunt a meaner breast, 



THE PIRATE 8 SONG. 

The pleasures bought with clanger 

For us have greater zest ; 
The world will loud revile us, 

But shall our cheeks grow pale ? 
The strong find cause of laughter 

When e'er the feeble rail. 
Away upon the waters ! 

The fair wind chides delay, 
Where others sowed the reapers, 

And all we meet our prey ! 

Frederick Pinkney, Maryland. 



227 




EDWARD COOTE PINKNEY. 




N" the third volume of his " Literati," Edgar 
A. Poe says : " It was the misfortune of Mr. 
Pinkney to have been born too far south. 
Had he been a New Englander, it is prob- 
able that he would have been ranked as the first of 
American lyrists by that magnanimous cabal which 
has so long controlled the destinies of American letters, 
in conducting the thing called 'The North American 
Review.' " Mr. Poe should have substituted the word 
fortune in the place of misfortune in writing of Edward 
Coote Pinkney, of Maryland. And more than this, Mr. 
Poe must have been in a most unamiable mood when 
referring to the criticism of Pinkney's poems by the 
North American Review. A criticism just and gen- 
erous to the fullest degree of justice is accorded 
to Pinkney's poems in the North American Review 
of October, 1825. In referring to the "Serenade," 
the reviewer says: "If the name of Harrington or 
Garew had been subscribed to it, we should, in all 
probability, like other antiquaries, have been com- 
pletely taken in." And of the poem entitled "A 
Health," the following is written: "If he who reads 
it is a lover already it will make him love the more, 
and if he is not, he will determine to become one forth- 
with. There is a devotion and delicacy about it, an 



EDWARD COOTE PINKNEY. 229 

ardent and at the same time respectful and spiritual 
passion breathed out in it which must insure for it a 
ready admiration." 

In alluding, however, to the poem of "Rodolph" some 

severe comments are indulged in, which are not entirely 

undeserved by the author, and it is probably this just 

censure that calls forth the indignation of Mr. Poe. 

The Reviewer says : " We do not like the moral tone of 

this poetry. It is too close and too loud an echo to that 

of Byron. There is that abstracted and selfish gloom 

and moodiness about it, that solitary want of kindly 

human sympathies, that stiff and hard casing of pride, 

that sullen dissatisfaction with the present state, and 

that reckless doubt or disbelief of a future one, which 

seem to have been caught from Byron, and of which we 

have already had loo much in Byron." The inspirer 

as well as the subject of most of hi< songs was a young 

lady of Baltimore city, a noted belle and beauty of that 

time. She was a Miss Mary Hawkins, who afterward 

became the wife of Mr. David McKim. It was to the 

fair Mary that the "Serenade" was sung; to her 

" starry eyes " he addressed himself, and she was the 

" seeming paragon " who walked through all his 

dreams. To her he drank a "Health" of which any 

woman might be proud; so pure is the offering, so 

sparkling the cup. Yet his love, like that of most 

poets, was unrequited, and his songs were left to be 

learned by less susceptible hearts, and sung to more 

fortunate loves. The year preceding the publication 

of his poems he was admitted to the Bar, and in the 

same year, 1824, he married "the beautiful Miss 

Georgeana McCausland," who was the daughter of 

Marcus McCausland, Esq., a highly respected citizen 

of Baltimore. At an early age, Edward Pinkney had 

entered the United States navy; but soon after the 

19* 



230 EDWARD COOTE PINKNEY. 

death of his father, in the year 1822, in consequence of 
a personal difficulty with his superior officer, he re- 
signed his commission. He was one who believed in 
"the holy text of pike and gun" most implicitly; he 
challenged Commodore Ridgely to fight. The chal- 
lenger was but a midshipman at the time, a mere 
bantling in the eyes of a weather-beaten tar, and so he 
was forced to resign. This circumstance would be a 
laughable one were it not for the sad after-scenes into 
which it introduced our rash young poet. It was after 
this that he was admitted to the Bar. His thorough 
knowledge of mathematics, together with a perfect ac- 
quaintance with the works of classical authors, gained 
for Pinkney, who had already won the name of poet, a 
high place among the scholars of his state. In 1826 
he was appointed Professor of Rhetoric and Belles 
Lettres in the University of Maryland. His professor- 
ship was, however, without emolument, and he was 
obliged to abandon the calling most suited to his 
talents. 

War was at that time raging between Spain and 
Mexico. Pinkney, having abandoned the profession of 
law, embarked for Mexico with the determination of 
seeking employment in the Mexican navy. The Mexi- 
cans, however, having become jealous of the too frequent 
admission of foreigners into their Navy, refused further 
applications coming from Americans Commodore 
Porter, who was then Commander-in-Chief of the 
Mexican naval forces, used his influence in Pinkney's 
behalf, and the offer of his services was accepted ; yet 
some delay was necessary to remove any obstacle in the 
way of place. If "delays are dangerous" to common 
mortals, they certainly proved so in the case of this 
young "fire-eater," for he became involved in a quarrel 
with a Mexican officer whom he killed in a duel ; he 



EDWARD COOTE PINKNEY. 231 

was then obliged to leave the country to avoid prosecu- 
tion by the Mexican authorities. Afflicted with illness 
and deeply merged in debt, he returned with a broken 
spirit to his native city. In the year 1827 he was chosen 
as the editor of "The Marylander," a partizan paper 
published in the interests of the Adams party. The 
first number was issued in the city of Baltimore, on 
Wednesday, the 3d of December, 1827. General 
Andrew Jackson was elected to the Presidency, how- 
ever, and the existence of the paper ceased. As an 
editor, Pinkney was noted for grace and vigor of style, 
yet its beauty was marred by extreme party-spirit and 
merciless invective. Although his nervous system was 
completely shattered by the encroachment of disease, 
the brilliancy of his intellect remained undimmed to 
the moment of his death. The following is an extract 
from one of the newspapers of the day ; Edward Coote 
Pinkney is the subject: "To describe his person as it 
was before disease had made its ravages upon it, when 
he stood erect in the youthful pride of manhood, would 
require a genius like his own, a poet who could make 
his pen subserve the purposes both of pen and pencil. 
We have never seen manly beauty exhibited in such 
just proportions, or with so much effect. His form 
rose gracefully a few degrees above the common height 
of man, — every feature, every limb seemed the master- 
piece of Nature. The ample forehead, the mild, yet 
piercing eye, the happy blending of color in his counte- 
nance, its placid, yet melancholy and intelligent ex- 
pression rendered him an object of interest to every 
beholder." 

A " child of nature," he possessed that misnamed 
generosity of spirit which is ungenerous to self — that 
charity which does not work at home. He never re- 
fused aid to another, and has been known to pawn his 



232 EDWARD COOTE PINENEY. 

valuable articles of jewelry in behalf of those who seemed 
poorer than himself. He was endowed also with vir- 
tues most beautiful. He was honorable and brave, and 
despised the lack of honor or bravery in other men. 
In discussing his sins, remember also his virtues. 

44 What's done we partly may compute, 
Yet know not what's resisted." 

The death of a wise parent at an age when he most 
needed the guidance and advice of a maturer mind and 
judgment is to be deplored. He yielded to dissipations 
which undermined his health, and caused his death in 
the very flower of manhood. 

He was the seventh child of William Pinkney, born 
in London, England, on the 1st day of October, 1802. 
He died in Baltimore, Friday night, at ten minutes past 
tin o'clock, on the 11th of April, 1828, aged twenty-six 
years. He was buried in the Unitarian Cemetery, near 
Baltimore. The funeral services were conducted by 
the Eev. William Ware, of New York. In the month 
of May, 1872, his remains were disinterred and buried 
in Greenmount Cemetery. At the time of writing this ? 
no monument marks his grave. 

His wife survived her poet-husband, as she called 
him, many years. She loved him, as only women love, 
through all the days of her life. He left one child, a 
son, who still exists, though afflicted with an incura- 
ble disease of the brain since his childhood. 

A second edition of Pinkney' s poems was published 
at Baltimore in the year 1838. His poems were again 
published, with an introduction by the poet Nathaniel 
Parker Willis, in the series of the Mirror Library, enti- 
tled the Morocco. A biographical notice of Edward 
Pinkney, by William Leggett, appeared in the New York 
Mirror in 18*47. Pinkney's name will also be found in 
the London Atheneum of 1835, under the head of 



EDWARD COOTE PINKNEY. oJZ 

" Literature of the 19th Century," and in 1869 in Triib- 
ner's Guide to American Literature. 

Such is a record of the brief life of Edward Pinkney. 
Let us be gentle — he is dead. If amid the sublime 
virtues of our heroes and heroines some sin glares out 
it is but the baleful mark of humanity. We will recall 
the words of the Austrian Empress to her son, Francis 
the First, upon the discovery of the evidences of her 
husband's frailties after his death: 

" Remember nothing of them except my forgiveness 
and his virtues. Imitate his great qualities, but beware 
lest you fall into the same vices, in order that you may 
not in your turn be put to the blush by those who 
scrutinize your life." 




A HEALTH, 



By Edward Coote Pinkney. 



I FILL this cup to one made up 
Of loveliness alone, 
A woman, of her gentle sex 

The seeming paragon; 
To whom the better elements 

And kindly stars have given 

A form so fair, that, like the air, 

'Tis less of earth than heaven. 

Her every tone is music's own, 

Like those of morning birds, 
And something more than melody 

Dwells ever in her words; 
The coinage of her heart are they, 

And from her lips each flows 
As one may see the burthened bee 

Forth issue from the rose. 

Affections are as thoughts to her, 

The measures of her hours ; 
Her feelings have the fragrancy, 

The freshness of young flowers ; 
And lovely passions changing oft, 

So fill her, she appears 
The image of themselves by turns,- 

The idol of past years. 



A HEALTH. 235 

Of her bright face one glauce will trac , 

A picture oq the brain, 
Aud of her voice in echoing hearts 

A sound must long remain ; 
But memory, such as mine of her, 

So very much endears, 
When death is nigh my latest sigh 

Will not be life's, but hers. 

I filled this cup to one made up 

lovliness alone, 
A woman, of her gentler sex 

The seeming paragon — 
Her health ! and would on earth there stood 

Some more of such a frame, 
That life might be all poetry, 

And weariness a name. 




FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 



" Bit ssed are the peace-makers, for they sha)l be called Tht 

Children of GodJ 7 - 




EANCIS SCOTT KEY was born in the year 
1779, in Frederick county, Maryland. His 
father, John Eoss Key, was a lieutenant in the 
Second Kifle Company of Maryland, under 
Captain Thomas Price, in the war of Independence. 
This company marched to Boston at the outbreaking of 
the Keyolution. Philip Barton Key was the brother of 
John Ross Key, and a noted Tory. The property of the 
latter haying been confiscated, the magnanimous spirit 
of John Eoss Key was evinced by a noble act. He di- 
vided equally with his brother his own possessions. 
John Eoss Key was the owner of a fine estate in Fred- 
erick county. The mansion, built of brick, covered a 
large area of ground. From a centre building extended 
wings on either side, while around the whole were broad 
piazzas according to the southern fashion. On every 
side stretched a beautiful lawn, which sloped almost 
imperceptibly into a terraced garden of nower and 
shrub. Many trees shaded the lawn, and not far distant 
in sombre grandeur stood a wood through which flowed, 
with happy murmurs, Pipe Creek. 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 



237 



At the foot of the hill upon which stood the Key 
mansion was a spring of limpid water, about whose 
brink gathered the gay-hearted youths and maidens of 
the neighborhood. 

The meadow that stretched- out from the foot of the 
hill was, in the genial months of Spring and Summer, 
very green. Seeming to rest against the sky, rose the 
Catoctin Mountain, now merged in shadows, now seen 
below a curtain of purple or crimson clouds, or else 
with its clear back-ground of summer-blue, its dusky 
foreshadows extending along the base, while peak and 
crag glowed with the sun-gold of morning or evening. 
Such was the birth-place of Francis Scott Key. His 
sister, Anne Phebe Charlotte, was the friend and com- 
panion of his boyhood days. This girl and boy were 
the only children of John Eoss Key. They were re- 
markable for physical beauty, as well as for those rarer 
beauties of heart and mind that leave in some shape a 
lasting impression for those who follow. They loved 
enthusiastically all lovely things of God's creation, 
therefore they loved one another with peculiar devotion. 
In the following lines, suggested by his departure from 
home for school, the young student reveals his pure 
affection for his sister : 

I think of thee — I feel the glow 

Of that warm thought — yet well I know 

No verse a brother's love may show, 

My sister ! 
But ill should I deserve the name 
Or warmth divine, that poet's claim, 
If I for thee no lay could frame, 

My sister ! 
I think of thee — of those bright hours, 
Rich in Life's first and fairest flowers, 
When childhood's gay delights were ours, 

My sister ! 
20 



238 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

Those sunny paths were all our own, 
And thou and I were there alone, 
Each to the other only known, 
My sister ! 

In every joy and- every care, 
We two, audwe alone, were there, 
The brightness and the gloom to share, 
My sister ! 

And then there came that dreaded day 
When I with thee no more must stay, 
But to the far school haste away, 
My sister 1 

Sad was the parting — sad the days, 
And dull the school, and dull the plays, 
Ere I again on thee may gaze, 
My sister ! 

But longest days may yet be past, 
And cares of school away be cast, 
And home and thee be seen at last, 
My sister ! 

The mountain-top, the meadow plain, 
The winding creek, the shaded lane, 
Shall shine in both our eyes again, 
My sister ! 

Who, then, shall first my greeting seek? 
Whose warm tear fall upon my cheek? 
And tell the joy she cannot speak ? 
My sister! 

This poem, though rather hackneyed in style and 
common-place in expression, contains a depth of affection 
in its tone that is pure and beautiful. Whatever objec- 
tion may be brought by the critic against the poem, cer- 
tainly the strength of love between the brother and the 
sister is not sufficiently commonplace to have become 
hackneyed. 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 239 

Francis S. Key was educated at Saint John's College 
at Annapolis. The class to which he belonged was 
known as the " Tenth Legion," because of its brilliant 
successes. The President of the College at that time 
was Dr. John McDowell. Many years after, on the 22d 
of February, 1827, Mr. Key, by invitation, delivered an 
address before the Alumni of Saint John's, the subject 
being Education. After leaving college he read law in 
the office of Jeremiah Townley Chase, who was one of 
the judges of the General Court of Maryland at that 
time. One of his fellow-students was Koger Brooke 
Taney, afterward Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of 
the United States. The high polish and perfect culture 
of Annapolis society, rendered it an attractive place to 
the distinguished men and women of the day. Did a stu- 
dent wish for eminence in the Profession of the Law, he 
was sure to seek for its attainment in the good old city 
of Annapolis. Mr. Taney has told us of the scarlet- 
cloaked judges, sitting solemnly in chairs placed upon 
an elevated platform, and of the assembly of Maryland's 
famous lawyers gathered at the bar. Judge Chase re- 
quired of his students a strict attendance at the Court, 
that they might learn, by observation, the manner in 
which important cases were conducted. Mr. Key was 
thereby enabled, in early manhood, to attain to much 
knowledge through the experience of others, a precious 
legacy not always handed down through books. After 
his admission to the bar, Mr. Key returned to his native 
county. In the year 1801 he began the practice of the 
Law at Frederick City, Maryland. In a short time, how- 
ever, he removed to Georgetown, in the District of Co- 
lumbia. Here he rose to eminence as a lawyer in the 
Supreme Court of the United States, as well as the courts 
of Maryland and the District. In the year 1814 Francis 
Scott Key made himself famous as the author of the 
world-known song of "The Star Spangled Banner." 



240 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

Accompanied by Colonel John S. Skinner,* on board the 
cartel-ship Minden, 

Protected by the fair white flag that floats 
In times of war, the silent pledge of peace, 

Mr. Key went to ask the release of several prisoners, one 
among them being Dr. Beanes, of Upper Marlborough, 
in Maryland. 

These two gentlemen were detained on board the ship 
Surprise, yet were treated with courtesy the while. They 
were transferred again to the Minden, which was an- 
chored in view of Fort McHenry. While the conflict 
raged, Mr. Key remained in captivity, not knowing 
through the long night of September the 13th, whether 
Victory smiled on America or Great Britain. Aroused 
to agony by suspense, Mr. Key gazed through the mists 
of dawn in search of his country's starry flag. When 
day broke he beheld the Flag floating in proud defiance 
above the dark outlines of the Fort. In that moment 
the words of Liberty's triumphal song rose from his 
patriotic heart. It was hastily written in pencil on the 
back of an old letter, taken from his pocket. On the 
night after his arrival in the city of Baltimore, he wrote 
the words out in full and showed them to his brother- 
in-law, Judge Nicholson, who was one of the defenders 
of Fort McHenry. Judge Nicholson proved his recog- 
nition of its worth, by taking it to the office of " The 
Baltimore American," where he gave orders that it be 
printed in small hand-bill form for general circulation. 
The type-setter of the Star Spangled Banner was Samuel 

*It is of Mr. J. S. Skinner that the following was written by 
John Quincy Adams. (Adams' Memoirs, page 515, Vol. 4.) 

"He is a man of mingled character, of daring and pernicious 
principles, of restless and rash, and yet of useful and honorable 
enterprise. Ruffian, patriot and philanthropist are so blended in 
him, that I cannot appreciate him without a mingled sentiment 
of detestation and esteem." 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 241 

Sands, an apprentice boy in that office. He is now, in 
1874, the editor of the American Farmer, a valuable 
contribution to the agricultural interests of the country. 
The song was first sung by Charles Durang, in a restau- 
rant next to the Holliday Street Theatre. 

It was next sung by the Durang Brothers, amateur 
actors, at the Holliday Street Theatre. It was received 
and re-echoed with enthusiasm. It had " a run " of 
several weeks, and was greeted each night with unflag- 
ging interest. From this introduction the Holliday 
Street Theatre won a national reputation, while on its 
stage moved the most renowned actors of the period. 
This patriotic offering of an incorruptible soul pene- 
trated the hearts of the people, as can only the glad 
hymn of a nation's victory or the mournful note of its 
death-wail ! It rang like an exultant laugh throughout 
the Land of its birth — The Republic of America. 

The Star Spangled Banner. 

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light, 

What so proudly we hailed, at the twilight's last gleaming? 
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight, 

O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming; 
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air, 
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there: 
O, say does that Star Spangled Banner ytt wave 
O'er the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave? 

On that shore dimly been through the mists of the deep, 

Where the foe's haughty host iu dread silence reposes, 
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep, 

As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses? 
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam, 
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream: 
'Tis the Star Spangled Bauner; O long may it wave 
O'er the Laud of the Free and the Home of the Brave ! 

And where are the foes who so vauntiugly swore 
That the havoc of War, and the Battle's confusion, 
20* 



242 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

A Home and a Country should leave us no more? 

Their hlood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution. 
No refuge could save the hireling and slave 
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave; 
And the Star Spangled Banner in triumph doth wave 
O'er the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave ! 

O thus be it ever, wheu freemen shall stand 

Between their loved homes and the war's desolation ; 
Blest with Victory and Peace, may the heaven-rescued land 

Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a Nation ! 
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just, 
And this be our motto, "In God is our trust;" 
And the Star Spangled Banner in triumph shall wave 
O'er the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave! 

The banner which aroused the inspiration of " Frank " 
Key into song, is said to be the property of Mrs. George- 
ana Armistead Appleton, of Boston, Massachusetts. 
This lady is the daughter of Colonel Armistead, who 
commanded Fort McHenry during its bombardment by 
the British forces. Colonel Armistead was a staunch 
patriot, noted for his bravery — so brave that he acknowl- 
edged with pleasure the brave deeds of others. He was 
not one of those officers who, by the frequent use of a 
certain little pronoun, excludes from official notice, as 
well as the notice of the world, all under his command. 
He accorded praise wherever it was due. 

The following letter from the pen of Chief Justice 
Taney has several times appeared in print; yet it 
should not for this reason be any the less acceptable to 
the people of this country. It is addressed to his friend, 
Mr. Charles Howard, of Maryland : 

Washington, D. C, March 12th, 1856. 
My Dear Sir — I promised some time ago to give you an ac- 
count of the incidents in the life of Mr. F. S. Key, which led him 
to write the " Star Spangled Banner," and of the circumstances 
under which it was written. The song has become a national 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 243 

one, and will, I think, from its great merit, continue to be so, 
especially in Maryland; and everything that, concerns its Author 
must be a matter of interest, to his children and descendants, 
and I proceed to fulfill my promise with the more pleasure, be- 
cause, while the song shows his genius and taste as a poet, the 
incidents connected with it, and the circumstances under which 
it was written, will show his character and worth as a man. 
The scene he describes, and the warm spirit of patriotism which 
breathes in the song, were not the offspring of mere fancy or 
poetic imagination. He describes what he actually saw. And 
he tells us what he felt while witnessing the conflict, and what 
he felt when the battle was over and the victory won by his 
countrymen. Every woid came warm from his heart, and for 
that reason, even more than from its poetical merit, it never 
fails to find a response in the hearts of those who listen to it. 
You will remember that in 1814, when the song was written, I 
resided in Frederick, and Mr. Key in Georgetown. You will 
also recollect, that soon alter the British troops retired from 
Washington, a squadron of the enemy's ships made their way 
up the Potomac and appeared before Alexandria, which was 
compelled to capitulate; and the squadron remained there some 
days, plundering the town of tobacco aud whatever else they 
wanted. It w.-'S rumored, and believed in Frederick, that a 
marauding attack of the same character would be made on 
Washington and Georgetown before the ships left the river. 
Mr. Key's family were still in Georgetown. He would not, and 
indeed could not with honor, leave the place while it was 
threatened by the enemy, for he was a volunteer in the light 
artillery, commanded by Major Peter, which was composed of 
citizens of the District of Columbia, who had uniformed them- 
selves and offered their services to the Government, and who had 
been employed iu active service from the time the British fleet 
appeared in the Patuxent preparatory to the movement upon 
Washington. And Mrs. Key refused to leave home, while Mr. 
Key was thus daily exposed to danger. Believing, as we did, 
that an attack would probably be made on Georgetown, we 
became very anxious about the situation of his family; for if the 
attack was made Mr. Key would be with the troops engaged in 
the defense, and as it was impossible to foresee what would be 
the issue of the conflict, his family, by remaining in George- 
town, might be placed iu great and useless peril. When I speak 



244 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

of we, I mean Mr. Key's father and mother, and Mrs. Taney and 
myself; but it was agreed among us that I should go to George- 
town and try to persuade Mrs. Key to come away with their 
children and stay with me or with Mr. Key's father until the 
danger was over. When I reached Georgetown I found the 
English ships still at Alexandria, and a body of militia encamped 
in Washington, which had been assembled to defend the city. 
But it was then believed, from information received, that no 
attack would be made by the enemy on Washington or George- 
town, and preparations were making on our part to annoy them 
by batteries on shore when they desceuded the river. 

The knowledge of these preparations probably hastened their 
departure; and the second or third day after my arrival the 
ships were seen moving down the Potomac. On the evening of 
the day that the enemy disappeared, Mr Richard West arrived 
at Mr. Key's and told him that after the British army passed 
through Upper Marlboro', on their return to their ships, and had 
encamped some miles below the town, a detachment was sent 
back, which entered Dr. Beanes' house about midnight, com- 
pelled him to rise from his bed, and hurried him off to the British 
camp, hardly allowing him time to put his clothes on; that he 
was treated with great harshness, and closely guarded; and that 
as soon as his friends were apprized of his situation they has- 
tened to the headquarters of the English army to solicit his 
release, but it was peremptorily refused, and they were not per- 
mitted to see him; and that he had been carried as a prisoner 
on board the fleet. And finding their own efforts unavailing, 
and alarmed for his safety, his friends in and about Marlboro' 
thought it advisable that Mr. West should hasten to Georgetown 
and request Mr. Key to obtain the sanction of the Government 
to his going on board the Admiral's Ship, under a flag of truce, 
and endeavoring to procure the release of Dr. Beanes, bef>re the 
fleet sailed. It was then lying at the mouth of the Potomac, 
and its destination was not at that time known with certainty. 
Dr Beanes, as perhaps you know, was the leading physician in 
Upper Marlboro', and an accomplished scholar and gentleman. 
He was highly nspected by all who knew him; was the family 
physician of Mr. West, and the intimate friend of Mr. Key. 
He occupied one of the best houses in Upper Marlboro', and 
lived very handsomely, and his house was selected for the quar- 
ters of Admiral CocUburn, and some of the principal officers of 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 245 

the Army, wheu the British troops encamped at Marlboro' on 
their march to Washington. These officers were, of course, 
furnished with everything that the house could offer; and they, 
in return, treated him with much courtesy, and placed guards 
around his grounds and outhouses to prevent depredations by 
their troops But on the return of the army to the ships, after 
the main body had passed through the town, stragglers who had 
left the ranks to plunder, or from some other motive, made their 
appearance from time to time, singly or in small squads, and 
Dr. Beanes put himself at the head of a small body of citizens, 
to pursue and make prisoners of them. Information of this 
proceeding was by some means or other conveyed to the Eng- 
lish camp, and the detachment of which I have spoken was 
sent back to release the prisoners, and seize Dr. Beanes. They 
did not seem to regard him, and certainly did not treat him as a 
prisoner of War, but as one who had deceived and broken his 
faith to them. 

Mr. Key readily agreed to undertake the mission in his favor, 
and the President promptly gave his sanction to it. Orders 
were immediately issued to the vessel usually employed as a 
cartel in the communications with the fleet in the Chesapeake 
to be made ready without delay; and Mr John S. Skinner who 
was agent for the Government for flags of truce and exchange 
of prisoners, and was well known as such by officers of the fleet, 
was directed to accompany Mr. Key. And as soon as the ar- 
rangements were made he hastened to Baltimore, where the Vessel 
was, to embark ; and Mrs. Key and the children went with me 
to Frederick, and thence to his father's, on Pipe creek, where 
she remained until he returned. We heard nothing of him 
until the enemy retreated from Baltimore, which, as well as I 
can now recollect, was a week or ten days after he left us ; and we 
were becoming uneasy about him, when, to our great joy, he 
made his appearance at my house on his way to join his family. 
He told me that he found the British fleet at the mouth of the 
Potomac preparing for the expedition against Baltimore. He 
was courteously received by Admiral Cochrane and the officers 
of the army as well as the navy. But when he made known his 
business his application was received so coldly that he feared it 
would fail. General Ross and Admiral Cockburn, who accom- 
panied the expedition to Washington, particularly the latter, 
spoke of Dr. Beanes in very harsh terms, and seemed at first 



246 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

not disposed to release him. It however happened, fortuuately, 
that Mr. Skinner carried letters from the wounded British officers 
left at Bladensburg; and in these letters to their friends on 
board the fleet they all spoke of the humanity and kindness 
with which they had been treated after they had fallen into our 
hands. And after a good deal of conversation and strong 
representations from Mr. Key as to the character and standing 
of Dr. Beanes, and of the deep interest which the community 
in which he lived took in his fate, General Ross said that Dr. 
Beanes deserved much more punishment than he had received, 
but that he felt himself bound to make a return for the kind- 
ness which had been shown to his wounded Officers whom he 
had been compelled to leave at Bladensburg, and upon that 
ground, and that only, he would release him But Mr. Key was at 
the same time informed that neither he nor any one else would 
be permitted to leave the fleet for some days, and must be de- 
tained until the attack on Baltimore, which was then about to 
be made, was over. But he was assured that they would make 
him and Mr. Skinner as comfortable as possible while they de- 
tained them. Admiral Cochrane, with whom they dined on 
the day of their arrival, apologized for not accommodating 
them in his own ship, saying that it was crowded already 
with Officers of the Army, but that they would be well taken 
care of in the Frigate Surprise, commanded by his son, Sir 
Thomas Cochrane. And to this Frigate they were accordingly 
transferred. Mr. Key had an interview with Dr. Beanes before 
General Ross consented to release him. I do not recollect 
whether he was on board the Admiral's ship or the Surprise, 
but I believe it was the former He found him in the forward 
part of the ship, among the sailors and soldiers; he had not had 
a change of clothes from the time he was seized ; was con- 
stantly treated with indignity by those around him, and no offi- 
cer would speak to him. He was treated as a culprit and not 
as a prisoner of War. And this harsh and humiliating treat- 
ment continued until he was placed on board the cartel. Some- 
thing must have passed when the officers were quartered at his 
house on the march to Washington, which, in the judgment of 
General Ross, bound him not to take up arms against the Eng- 
lish forces until the troops had re-eml>arked. 

It is impossible, on any other ground, to account for the man- 
ner in which he was spoken of and treated. But whatever Gen- 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 24*7 

eral Ross and the other Officers may have thought, I am quite 
sure that Dr. Beanes did not think he was in any way pledged 
to abstain from active hostilities against the public enemy. And 
when he made prisoners of the stragglers, he did not consider 
himself as a prisoner on parole, nor suppose himself to be vio- 
lating any obligation he had himself incurred. For he was a 
gentleman of untainted character and a nice sense of honor, and 
incapable of doing anything that could have justified such treat- 
ment. Mr. Key imputed the ill-usage he received to the influ- 
ence ot Admiral Cockburn, who, it is still remembered, while he 
commanded in the Chesapeake, carried on hostilities in a vindic- 
tive temper, assailing and plundering defenceless villages, or 
countenancing such proceedings by those under his command 
Mr. Key and Mr. Skinner continued on board of the Surprise, 
where they were very kindly treated by Sir Thomas Cochrane, 
until the fleet reached the Patapsco, and preparations were 
making for landing the troops. Admiral Cochrane then shifted 
his flag to the Frigate in order that he might be able to move 
further up the River, and superintend in person the attack by 
water on the Fort. And Mr. Key and Mr. Skinner were then 
sent on board their own vessel, with a guard of sailors or marines, 
to prevent them from landing. They were permitted to take 
Dr. Beanes with them, and they thought themselves fortunate in 
being anchored in a position which enabled them to see distinct- 
ly the flag of Fort McHenry from the deck of the vessel. He 
proceeded then with much animation to describe the scene on 
the night of the bombardment. He and Mr. Skinner remained 
on deck during the night watching every shell, from the moment 
it was fired until it fell, listening with breathless interest to hear 
if an explosion followed. While the bombardment continued 
it was sufficient proof that the Fort had not surrendered. But it 
suddenly ceased some time before day ; and as they had no com- 
munication with any of the enemy's ships, they did not know 
whether the Fort had surrendered, or the attack upon it had been 
abandoned. They paced the deck for the residue of the night in 
painful suspense, watching with intense anxiety the return of 
day, and looking every few minutes at their watches, to see how 
long they must wait for it; and as soon as it dawned, and before 
it was light enough to see objects at a distance, their glasses were 
turned to the Fort, uncertain whether they should B ee there the 
Stars and Stripes or the flag of the enemy. At length the light 



248 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

came, and they saw that " our flag was still there." Aud as the 
day advanced they discovered, from the movements of the boats 
between the shore and the fleet, that the troops had been roughly 
handled, and that many wounded men were carried to the ships- 
At length he was informed that the attack on Baltimore had 
failed, and the British army was re-embarking, and that he and 
Mr. Skinner and Dr. Beanes would be permitted to leave them 
and go where they pleased as soon as the troops were on board 
and the fleet ready to sail. He then told me that under the ex- 
citement of the time he had written a song, and handed me a 
printed copy of the " Star Spangled Banner." When I had read 
it and expressed my admiration, I asked him how he found time 
in the scenes he had been passing through to compose such a 
song ? He said he commenced it on the deck of their vessel, in 
the fervor of the moment, when he saw the enemy hastily re- 
treating to their ships, and looked at the flag he had watched for 
so anxiously as the morning opened ; that he had written some 
lines, or brief notes that would aid him in calling them to mind 
upon the back of a letter which he happened to have in his 
pocket; and for some of the lines, as he proceeded, he was 
obliged to rely altogether upon his memory; and that he finished 
it in the boat on his way to the shore, and wrote it out as it now 
stands at the Hotel on the night he reached Baltimore, and im- 
mediately after he arrived. He said that on the next morning 
he took it to Judge Nicholson to ask him what he thought of it, 
and he was so much pleased with it, that he immediately sent it 
to a printer and directed copies to be struck off in hand-bill form ; 
and that he, Mr. Key, believed that it had been favorably received 
by the Baltimore public. 

Judge Nicholson and Mr. Key, you know, were nearly con- 
nected by marriage, Mrs. Key and Mrs. Nicholson being sisters. 
The Judge was a man of cultivated taste, and had at one time 
been distinguished among the leading men in Congress, and was 
at that period of which I am speaking the Chief Justice of the 
Baltimore Court, and one of the Judges of the Court of Appeals 
of Maryland. Notwithstanding his judicial character, which 
exempted him from military service, he accepted the command 
of a volunteer company of artillery. And when the enemy ap- 
proached, and an attack on the Fort was expected, he and his 
company offered their services to the Government to assist in 
its defence. They were accepted, and formed a part of the garri- 






FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 249 

son during the bombardment. The judge had been relieved 
from doty, and returned to his family only the night before Mr. 
Key slowed him his song. And you may easily imagine the 
feelings with which, at such a moment, he read it and gave it 
to the pablic. It was, no doubt, as Mr. Key modestly expressed 
it, favorably received. In less than an hour after it was placed 
in the hands of the printer, it was all over town, and hailed with 
enthusiasm, and took its place at once as a national song. 

I have made this account of "The Star Spangled Banner" 
longer than I intended, and find that I have introduced inci- 
dents and persons outside of the subject I originally contem- 
plated. But I have felt a melancholy pleasure in recalling events 
connected, in any degree, with the life of one with whom I was 
so long and so intimately united in friendship and affection, and 
whom I so much admired for his brilliant genius and loved for 
his many virtues. I am sure, however, that neither you nor 
any of his children or descendants will think the account I have 
given too long. "With great regard, dear sir, 

Your friend truly, R. B. TANEY. 

Charles Howard, Esq. 

Although Mr. Key possessed considerable literary- 
ability, and the soul of a true poet, the " Star Spangled 
Banner" is the only poem left to us, (his sacred songs 
excepted,) that does credit to his name or fame. It is 
to be regretted that the yolume entitled "Key's Poems " 
ever was allowed to be published. Evidently these 
rhymes, written in a spirit of gaiety, were never in- 
tended to be seen beyond the household circle. In such 
a mood of gaiety he wrote an address to u The Twelfth 
Night Queen." The queen was Miss Katharine Murray 
of Annapolis. According to an old English custom the 
twelfth night was always an occasion of festivity and 
reunion. On the twelfth night of January, 1833, was 
solemnized the marriage of Miss Josephine Harwood. 
She was the daughter of an old and respected citizen of 
Annapolis. The bridegroom, Edward Tilton, was a 
young officer of the United States Navy. Miss Har- 
21 



250 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

wood's wedding night was rendered doubly joyous by the 
crowning of the " Queen " at the home of the bride, 
and we can well imagine the " toasts " and graceful 
compliments of which Miss Katharine Murray was the 
recipient forty "golden years ago." The Bride, the 
Queen and the Poet were connected by ties of blood and 
marriage. 

Francis Key was a contemporary of Edward Coote 
Pinkney, and contributed to the same periodicals for 
which the Poet wrote. He was a man of great refine- 
ment and culture of manner as well as of intellect. He 
won for himself the esteem of all good people by living 
up to the standard of a Christian and an honorable gen- 
tleman. The line of difference is distinctly drawn be- 
tween his character and that of John Randolph, of 
Roanoke, in the following anecdote: Mr. Key was on 
intimate terms of friendship with Mr. Randolph, who, 
being confined to his rooms by illness upon one occa- 
sion, was engaged in conversation with Mr. Key, who 
had called upon him at the hotel. Not long after Mr. 
Key entered the room an officer of high rank in the 
British Navy, deeming himself on intimate terms with 
Mr. Randolph, merely knocked at the door, then open- 
ing it entered unannounced. Turning hastily around, 
Randolph cried out in a rude mannner : " Busy, my lord, 
bii3y ! Always apply to my servant before you enter 
my lodgings." 

" Beg pardon," answered the officer, who immedi- 
ately withdrew. Mr. Key said : 

"Mr. Randolph, how can you treat a gentleman in 
this -way? He meant nothing wrong." "Neither do 
hogs mean wrong when they enter my corn-fields ; but 
I always turn them out," was the answer- of John 
Randolph. An old friend of Mr. Key says: "Every 
body who knew Frank Key loved him, and there was 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 251 

not a more agreeable companion to be found " Mr. 
Key was an Episcopalian. Gentle and unassuming in 
the practice of his belief, and generous in his toleration 
of others. He taught a Sunday-school class for many 
years at the "Rock Creek Church. 77 

His wife was a Miss Lloyd, of Maryland, the young- 
est sister of Governor Edward Lloyd, and their home 
was noted for its hospitality, particularly to strangers. 

In the year 1833, June 29th, Mr. Key was appointed 
to the position of United States Attorney for the 
District of Columbia by the President, General Jack- 
son. He was re-appointed January 6th, 1837. He was 
called upon to fill the same office the third time, Janu- 
ary the 13th, 1837, under President Van Buren. He 
was distinguished for his ability in performing the 
duties of his office, and is mentioned as one of the con- 
fidential friends of the President, Andrew Jackson. 

During the nullification agitation in this country he 
was sent unofficially to the South. He remained for 
some time in the city of Charleston, and it is said that 
to him is due partly the peaceful termination of the 
difficulty. After the removal of the public deposits 
from the Bank of the United States by Roger B. Taney, 
and after he had been rejected as the Secretary of the 
Treasury of the United States by the Satiate, many 
demonstrations of the people 7 s regard were shown in 
his behalf. About this time a public dinner was given 
in his honor in the grounds of the court house, at 
Frederick, Maryland. Mr. Key being a guest, the 
following toast was offered and drunk: "Francis S. 
Key — a friend of the administration, and an incorrupti- 
ble patriot — worthy of being honored wherever genius 
is admired, or liberty cherished, as the author of the 
Star Spangled Banner. 75 Mr. Key expressed his thanks 
and said : 



252 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

" He never had forgotten and never should forget that 
he was a native of the county whose citizens were as- 
sembled upon an occasion so gratifying to his feelings. 
Though no longer a resident, its people and its scenes 
had never ceased to be dear to him. His annual visit 
here had been always anticipated with pleasure, and 
never, even from his boyhood, had he come within the 
view of these mountains without having his warmest 
affections awakened at the sight. What he felt now, in 
accepting the invitation with which he had been hon- 
ored, he should not attempt to express. The company 
had been pleased to declare their approbation of his 
song. Praise to a poet could not be otherwise than ac- 
ceptable; but it was peculiarly gratifying to him to 
know, that, in obeying the impulse of his own feelings, 
he had awakened theirs. The song he knew came from 
the heart, and if it had made its way to the hearts of 
men whose devotion to their country and to the great 
cause of freedom he so well knew, he could not pretend 
to be insensible to such a compliment. They had re- 
called to his recollection the circumstance under which 
he had been impelled to this effort. He had seen the 
flag of his country waving over a city, the strength and 
pride of his native State, a city devoted to plunder and 
desolation by its assailants. He witnessed the prepara- 
tions for its assault, and saw the array of its enemies as 
they advanced to the attack. He heard the sound of 
battle; the noise of the conflict fell upon his listening 
ear, and told him that " the brave " and " the free " had 
met the invaders. Then did he remember that Mary- 
land had called her sons to the defence of that flag, and 
that they were the sons of sires who had left their crim- 
son footprints on the snows of the North, and poured 
out the blood of patriots like water on the sands of the 
South. Then did he remember that there were gathered 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 253 

around that banner, among its defenders, men who had 
heard and answered to the call of their country, from 
whose mountain-sides, from this beautiful valley and 
this fair city of his native county, and though he 
walked upon a deck surrounded by a hostile fleet, de- 
tained as a prisoner, yet was his step firm and his heart 
strong as these recollections came upon him. Through 
the clouds of war the stars of that banner still shone 
in view, and he saw the discomfited host of its assail- 
ants driven back in ignominy to their ships. Then in 
that hour of deliverance and joyful triumph the heart 
spoke; and "does not such a country and such defend- 
ers of their country deserve a song?" was its question. 
With it came an inspiration not to be resisted ; and if it 
had been a hanging matter to make a song, he mnst have 
made it. Let the praise, then, if any be due, be given 
not to him, who only did what he could not help doing, 
not to the writer, but to the inspirers of the song. He 
would advert (he said), to another and still more glori- 
ous triumph- -to another of our cities assailed by the 
same army. Before New Orleans was the flower of the 
British Army, the veteran conquerors of Europe; men 
who had broken through hosts of disciplined warriors 
and the proudest walls that military science could erect. 
With what scorn must they have looked npon our cotton 
ramparts and rude militia? And the General who was 
to oppose, with such forces as these, their skillful and 
experienced leaders, what would they think of him? 
They thought of him, no doubt, as his present oppo- 
nents still profess to think of him, as an ignorant and 
rash man, unfit for any command. Yes, (he continued), 
even now, when he has administered the Government 
with unexampled wisdom and success, we are told that 
he is a man of no learning, of no ability as a writer or a 
speaker, and the most contemptuous comparisons are 
21* 



254 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

made between his qualifications and those of his rivals. 

Against such a leader and such forces, the proud host 

of the enemy came on. Where now are the great ora- 
tors and writers? "Ubi nunc facwndus Ulysses?" 

Where shall we find a man to disperse the advancing 
foes from the eloquence of a proclamation, or overwhelm 
them with the terrors of a speech ? Andrew Jackson 
was there. He made neither proclamation nor speech, 
but he put a tongue into the mouths of his artillery, 
and bade them speak to them. 

There was a speech to be held in everlasting remem- 
brance. It was written in the brightest page of our 
Country's history, and future conquerors who may desire 
to send their myrmidons to shores defended by freemen 
will be wise enough to remember it. He was not dis- 
posed (he said) to undervalue those talents in which it 
was said (upon what -authority he knew not) General 
Jackson was so inferior to the favorites of his opponents. 
The speaker and the writer may render essential ser- 
vices to the Country; but there are times which will 
demand doers instead of talkers, and every friend of his 
country has rejoic3d that we had the right sort of talent at 
the defence of New Orleans. It* their services were even 
equal all must admit that there was some difference in 
suffering and s .crifice between the talker and the doer, be- 
tween him who, on soft carpets and to smiling audiences, 
makes speeches for his country, and him whose nights 
are spent in sleepless vigilance and his days in toil and 
peril, who offers ease and health and life upon the altar 
of patriotism. If there was any suffering in speech- 
making certain patriots, whose daily labors in that way 
throughout the last winter had been so extraordinary, 
were greatly to be commisserated. For himself, he 
said that when he had a good subject, as he now had, 
and saw before him such a company as he now did, and 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 255 

read in their kindling countenances the warm feelings 
of approving hearts, he considered it a pleasure and a 
privilege to make a speech. But he would return to 
the song — the company had thought it worthy the 
honor of a toast. Perhaps they were not unreasonble 
in placing so high an estimate upon a song. It has 
been said by one thought wise in the knowledge of 
human nature that " if he could be allowed to make a 
nation's song he cared not who made its laws." 

He would undertake to say that if a nation's songs 
were of any importance to it there was but one way of 
providing a supply of them. He had adverted to the 
occasions of which he had spoken for the purpose of 
showing that way. If national poets, who shall keep 
alive the sacred fire of patriotism in the hearts of the 
people, are desirable to a country, the country must 
deserve them — must put forth her patriots and heroes, 
whose deeds alone can furnish the necessary inspiration. 
When a country is thus worthy of the lyre she will 
command its highest efforts. But if ever forgetful of 
her past and present glory, she shall cease to be " the 
Land of the Free and the home of the Brave," and be- 
come the purchased possession of a company of stock- 
jobbers and speculators; if her people are to be the 
bought vassals of a great moneyed corporation, and to 
bow down to her pensioned and privileged nobility ; if 
the patriots who shall dare to arraign her corrup- 
tions and denounce her usurpation are to be sacri- 
ficed upon her gilded altar ; such a country furnish venal 
orators and presses, but the soul of national poetry will 
be gone. The muse will " never bow the knee in Mam- 
mon's fame." No, the patriots of such a land must hide 
their shame in her deepest forests, and her bards must 
hang their harps upon the willows. Such a people, 
thus corrupted and degraded — 



256 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

"Living, shall forfeit fair renown ; 
And, doubly dying, shall go down 
To the vile dust from whence they sprang. 
Unwept, uuhonored and unsung." 

While holding the office of attorney tinder the Got- 
eminent of the United States Mr. Key had ever in view 
the high responsibility and trust of his position. "It 
is the duty of an attorney representing a government in 
a criminal prosecution to see that the prisoner has jus- 
tice done him, and not to aim only at conviction. He 
as well as the Court represents the law, whose officers 
they are." This was manifested in a remarkable in- 
stance, in a manner worthy of being recorded to the 
honor of Mr. Key and Maryland : In, the year 1836, at 
the funeral of Warren K. Davis, of South Carolina, a 
representative to the United States Congress, General 
Jackson and his Cabinet were in attendance. While 
waiting on the East Portico of the Capitol for the coffin 
to be brought from the Rotunda a man who had been 
concealed behind one of the pillars of the portico fired a 
pistol at the President. Undauntedly the President ad- 
vanced toward his assailant with uplifted cane, intending 
by striking the man's arm to prevent another shot. Sev- 
eral Cabinet Officers losing presence of mind pulled Gen- 
eral Jackson back, when another attempt was made to 
fire the pistol. The mischief intended, however, was 
probably prevented by the non-explosion of the pistol 
cap. The daring assailant was seized and taken into 
the custody of the Law. General Jackson, his friends 
and adherents believed this act of violence to be in- 
stigated by a party of political conspirators, headed 
by a United States Senator. The prisoner was taken 
before one of the judges of the Circuit Court of the 
District of Columbia for an examination. Francis S. 
Key, in behalf of the Government, appeared to conduct 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 257 

the inquiry. Mr. Frank P. Blair, Mr. R. H. Gillette 
and Mr. Kingman {Ion, of " The Baltimore Sun") 
beheld the whole transaction. Mr. Kingman was called 
before the court as a witness. He says that he remem- 
bers Mr. Key's circumspection regarding the pris- 
oner's right, as one accused before the Law, when con- 
ducting the inquiries. Filled with partisan suspicions he 
did not lose his calmness, allowing only a sense of jus- 
tice and a desire for the truth to influence him in the 
matter. He seemed aware of his responsibility in an 
inquiry of so grave a nature. The investigation, thus 
conducted, terminated in discovering the prisoner to le 
insane. He was immediately sent to the Asylum for the 
Insane near Washington, where he was seen by a noted 
Physician of Washington not many years ago. And here 
this poor fellow, who had played so important a part in 
a little drama, could be seen day after day standing 
with a grave countenance and clasped hands as he 
revolved his thumbs one about the other. When ques- 
tioned as to his occupation, his reply was ever the same : 
" I am keeping the weather ; " alas, far-shadowed prophet 
of Probabilities! 

Of Mr. Key, Mr. Kingman says: "He was one of the 
best and the noblest of men. A lawyer and an orator 
of the first rank. Ever interfering as a peacemaker be- 
tween men ; and striving for the good of the human 
race. Everybody honored and loved one so brave and 
yet so gentle." 

From the lately published " Casket of Reminiscences," 
by ex-Governor H. Foote, of Mississippi, the following 
extract is taken : 

" I do not remember to have at any time witnessed a 
more interesting forensic discussion than one to which 
I had the pleasure of listening in the Chamber of the 
Supreme Court of the United States in the beginning 



258 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

of the month of March, 1825. A vessel engaged in the 
African Slave Trade had been, a month or two before, 
seized on the coast of Florida, and had been regularly 
libeled for confiscation under the Act of Congress de- 
claring this species of traffic piracy. This case involved 
pecuniary interests of much magnitude and certain 
moral considerations also of much delicacy and dignity. 
The argument attracted a large assemblage of refined 
and intelligent persons of either sex. The discussion 
was opened by the celebrated Francis S. Key, so honor- 
ably known then and now as the author of "The Star 
Spangled Banner." Mr. Key had been employed to aid 
the Attorney General (Mr. Wirt), while Charles I. In- 
gersoll, of Philadelphia, and John M. Berrien, of Georgia, 
were enlisted in the enterprise. I was very much enter- 
tained with the whole argument, but I was particularly 
with the speech of Mr. Key and that of Mr. Berrien. 
Mr. Key was tall, erect, and of admirable physical pro- 
portions. There dwelt usually upon his handsome and 
winning features a soft and touching pensiveness of ex- 
pression almost bordering on sadness, but which in 
moments of special excitement, or when anything oc- 
curred to awaken the dormant heroism of his nature, or 
to call into action the higher power of vigorous and well 
cultivated intellect, gave place to a bright ethereality of 
aspect and a noble audacity of tone which pleased while 
it dazzled the beholder. His voice was capable of being 
in the highest degree touching and persuasive. His 
whole gesticulation was natural, graceful and impres- 
sive; and he was as completely free from everything 
like affectation or rhetorical grimace as any public speaker 
I have known. He had a singularly flowing, choice, and 
pointed phraseology, such as could not fail to be pleas- 
ing to persons of taste and discernment; and I am sure 
that no one ever heard him exhibit his extraordinary 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 259 

powers of discussion, to whom the ideas to which he 
essayed to give expression seemed at all cloudy or per- 
plexed, or his elocution clogged and torpid, even for the 
shortest possible period of time. On this occasion he 
greatly surpassed the expectations of his most admiring 
friends. The subject was particularly suited to his 
habits of thought, and was one which had long enlisted, 
in a special manner, the generous sensibilities of his 
soul. It seemed to me that he said all that the case 
demanded, and yet no more than was needful to be said ; 
and he closed with a thrilling and even an electrifying 
picture of the horrors connected with the African Slave 
Trade, which would have done honor either to a Pitt or 
a Wilberforce in their palmiest days." — Page 12. 

The following letter from the Paymaster-G-eneral of 
the United States Army proves the confidence reposed 
by General Jackson in the administrative wisdom of 
Mr. Key: 

Dear Miss Boyle : — I promised to give you a statement of 
an incident in the career of Francis S. Key, which occurred 
during the administration of General Jackson, and which was 
an example of the great confidence reposed in the tact and dis- 
cretion of Mr. Key by that Statesman. I have failed to find 
dates as I had hoped, but I think it took place in 1835. 

I was then serving with the Fourth Infautry as a Subaltern, of 
which regiment a distinguished Georgian, Brevet Major James 
S. Mcintosh, was a Captain, and then in command at Fort 
Mitchell, Alabama. He had performed very gallant and bril- 
liant service in t'le war of 1812, for which the State of Georgia 
gave him a sword. He was an officer of high spirit and iudomi- 
t ible pluck and of very chivalrous temper, as will be shown here- 
after. For it was for the protection of a single enlisted man 
that he took the st md, which arrayed against him the State of 
Alabama and its whole military power under the Governor. 

In execution of the Indian intercourse acts it became the duty 
of Major Mcintosh, upon the request of the Indian Agent, fci 
have removed from the Indian country certain intruders. In 



2 GO FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

execution of this order a Corporal, in self-defense, had unfortu- 
nately been compelled to shoot down one of Ibe intruders, who 
died of the wounds he had received. 

An indictment for murder was found against the Corporal. 
The whole frontier was excited. The sympathies of the whole 
population of that region were arrayed against the Indian Agent 
and the military. Major Mcintosh feared that any jury called 
out in that. region would not do justice to his soldier. Like old 
Hickory, he " took the responsibility " and refused to surrender 
the Corporal to the civil authorities. A posse of men from 
neighboring counties was at firs-t summoned, and finally all the 
militia of the State were called out by the Governor. The entire 
militia of the State of Alabama arrayed against Major Mcin- 
tosh and his two small companies of regulars ! 

General Jackson no doubt appreciated the chivalrous senti- 
ment and firmness of Mcintosh, but wishingpeaceand harmony, 
he put trust in Francis S. Key, then, I think, United States 
District Attorney for the District of Columbia, as Minister Pleni- 
potentiary upon the part of the United States between the State 
of Alabama and the obstinate Soldier. 

Mr. Key had no small task in his hands, for it was ever a 
tradition in the regiment that Major Mcintosh was not very 
easily persuaded to submit to the programme. When allusions 
weiemade by Mr. Key to the important principles involved, 
which made the example in this case very important and preg- 
nant with gocd or evil to the latest "posterity," Major Mcin- 
tosh exclaimed, ''let posterity take care of itself, I must take care 
of my soldier, whom the people intend to hang for the simple 
discharge of his duty I" 

Finally, however, Mr. Key succeeded, I think, by arranging 
for the trial of the soldier in a part of the State farthest re- 
moved from the Indian frontier. 

Very truly yours, 

March 26, 1875. BENJ. ALVORD. 

The following letter, written by Mr. Key to his aunt, 
Mrs. Maynadier, at Annapolis, Maryland, gives us an in- 
sight into his labors in behalf of the Negro race, and 
liis ardor in the cause: 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 



261 






Georgetown, January 24, 1819. 
My Dear Aunt:— I received your letter last night, and had 
before seen in the paper the notice for the meeting of the Col- 
onization Society. Our Court has been much longer than we 
expected, and is still sitting, and I fear I cannot get away from 
it as soon as Thursday. If I could, I would bring Mr. Burgess 
with me and all his African affairs; as it is, I shall try to send 
him, if I can get anybody to go with him. I have just been 
down to see if Mr. Herbert or Mercer could go, but I did not see 
them. I fear, however, that as they have bo interesting a ques- 
tion before them in Congress, they cannot leave their stations, 
and I cannot just now think of any one else. If it was put off 
for a week, or if they meet, elect their officers and do whatever 
else is necessary, and adjourn for a week to receive a communi- 
cation from us here, we could then send Mr. Burgess and our 
journals and papers and opinions, and some of us would try to 
come with him. I shall, nevertheless, (if I find I can do it), 
come on Thursday; and if not then, I think I could come about 
that day week. I will see Mr. Munro and bring your books if 
they are still to be had. The Testaments cannot be got cheaper 
here than the price you mention, but does not your Bible Society 
furnish Bibles and Testaments for Sunday Schools without 
charge ? I presume you could certainly get them in that way 
from Baltimore. With the hope of soon seeing you, 

I am ever your affectionate, F. KEY. 

McSherry says of this portion of our history, a sub- 
ject to be studied from 1836 to 1861 : "The wiser and 
more humane friends of the negro had early embarked 
in a truly noble and beneficent design — the American 
Colonization Society. Satisfied that the Black man 
could never mingle as an equal with the White race, 
they proposed to establish colonies on the western coast 
of Africa, and settle there those of the free and emanci- 
pated Blacks who should be willing to return to the 
land of their forefathers. A branch of this association 
was immediately formed in Maryland, as peculiarly 
suited to the views and necessities of the people. The 
association, however, was entirely subject to the National 
22 



262 FRANCrS SCOTT KEY. 

Society, and it was soon found to be too much under 
the control, or at least liable to the vexatious interfer- 
ence of the Northern Abolitionists. It was, therefore, 
determined to establish an independant organization in 
the State, and plant a separate Colony, under the name 
of " Maryland," in Liberia. This design, with a praise- 
worthy perseverance, was accordingly carried into effect. 
As it was not only founded upon enlarged philanthropic 
views, but upon sound policy, in the condition of the 
State, with its large free black population, an appeal 
was made to the Legislature for assistance. It was 
generously afforded. An annual appropriation of twenty 
thousand dollars, to be raised by taxation, was bestowed 
upon the Society, and never withheld or diminished in 
the darkest hours of pecuniary embarrassment, and three 
commissioners were appointed on behalf of the State to 
take part in its affairs. In spite of the opposition of 
the Abolitionists, its bitterest enemies, the Society con- 
tinued to flourish. Emigrants were yearly sent out to 
Cape Pal mas, and the Maryland colony is now one of 
the most prosperous on the western shore of Africa, 
having a considerable trade, and being visited periodi- 
cally by a regular packet from Baltimore. 

" The wisdom and good policy of fostering this noble 
scheme, is evident from a single glance at the statistics 
of the African race in Maryland, and the necessary re- 
sult of the present system of manumission. Their 
increase is exceedingly small — scarcely more than suf- 
ficient to supply the loss by deaths and transportation 
of slaves to the South. Thus, in 1810, they numbered, 
free and slave, 144,971 ; in 1840, 151,657; so that in a 
period of thirty years their aggregate increase was only 
6,686, and while there was an actual diminution in the 
number of slaves in that period of 21,783, there was a 
positive increase of free blacks of 28,469." 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 263 

Francis Scott Key manumitted all his slaves, and was 
one of the founders of the African Colonization Society. 
At the breaking out of the war between the North and 
the South, Maryland had one hundred thousand freed 
negroes, and eighty thousand slaves. The following 
extract from a Memorial presented at the Colonization 
Meeting in Washington city, May the 6th, 1842, is 
taken from " The African Repository and Colonial Jour- 
nal" of July, 1842: 

" The colony of Cape Palmas is a conclusive evidence 
of what a single state, and by an appropriation of a few 
thousand dollars annually, can accomplish in this 
cause. A prosperous colony of about six hundred 
emigrants has risen with all the order and institutions 
of a well organized society, under the fostering care of 
the Legislature of Maryland and citizens of this State, 
at the cost of less than the establishment of a single 
plantation of the South." 

And in an appeal from Mr. H. L. Ellsworth, one of 
the executive committee, he says: "I was most happy 
to hear our friend and early benefactor in the cause 
from Maryland (Francis S. Key, Esq.) declare what 
were the true interests of Maryland." 

The following resolution from Mr. Key will, how- 
ever, attest in the best manner the sentiments of that 
noble gentlemen. It was read by Mr. Key at a meeting 
of the convention on the 9th of May, 1842 : 

"Resolved, That a committee be appointed to pre- 
pare and present a memorial to Congress, recommend- 
ing such measures to be taken for the protection of the 
colonies now established on the African coast, the pro- 
motion of American commerce on that coast, and the 
suppression of the slave trade, as the National legisla- 
ture may approve." 

Then, with his accustomed eloquence, he continued : 



264 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

" Light has pierced into the thick darkness that has 
long enveloped that outcast Continent, and the treasures 
and blessings of a benignant Providence are seen to 
smile in all her plains and wave in all her forests. It 
is true this fair creation of God has been marred by the 
wickedness of Man. A trade, abominable and detest- 
able beyond all epithets that can be given to it, at the 
very name of which the blood curdles, and no man 
hears it who 

' Having human feelings does not blush 
And hang his head to think himself a man,' 

has long since desolated Africa and disgraced the world. 
This trade has been stamped with the double curse of 
offended Heaven — curse to the givers and receivers of 
the guilty traffic — to Africa, in the wretchedness, rapine 
and murder of her children, to her rapacious tempters 
in innumerable just and fearful retributions. 

" The wrath of God has been manifested at this crying 
iniquity on the blood-stained borders of all her coasts, 
where the angry elements are let loose against this in- 
human trade. What is the stormy cloud that darkens 
these infested shores but the frown of the Almighty ? 
What the fierce tornado but the blasting of the breath 
of displeasure ? It is true that under this curse Africa 
has long groaned and bled, and many a fair field, and 
happy village, and crowded town, has been made a wil- 
derness.' It is true she is still an awful sufferer. Even 
now, while we are speaking of her wrongs, some dis- 
tant and peaceful hamlet, hitherto beyond the reach of 
the spoiler, hidden, and hoped to be secured by inter- 
vening forests, has been hunted out and surrounded, 
and its sleep awakened by the shout of ruffians. 
But these horrors will have an end. The dawning of 
a better day appears. These wronged and wretched 
outcasts will be brought back into the family of Na- 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 265 

tions. The crimes that warring elements, and fearful 
visitations and judgments could not restrain shall have 
a conqueror. Man shall be honored as the instrument 
in accomplishing this work of mercy. Man's heart 
shall be softened and humanized, and glowing with 
love to God and Man go forth on this errand of com- 
passion. Thus the virtue and benevolence of Man 
shall repair the outrages committed by the inhumanity 
of Man. 

"The trade that has wasted and debased Africa shall 
be banished by a trade that shall enlighten and civilize 
her, and repeople her solitary places with her restored 
children. And Africa thus redeemed and rescued from 
curse, and the world from its reproach, shall 'vindicate 
the ways of God to Man.' " 

Mr. Key died suddenly while upon a visit to his 
daughter in Baltimore, after being attacked with pneu- 
monia, in January, 1843. When the fact of his death 
was made known to the Supreme Court of the United 
States, the court adjourned in honor of his memory. 
The next morning, January 13th, 1843, the Attorney- 
General of the United States, Mr. Legere, of South 
Carolina, after presenting the resolutions of condolence 
passed by the Bar, addressed the Court in the following 
manner: 

" May it please your honors, a meeting of the mem- 
bers of the Bar and officers of the Court, held since the 
adjournment yesterday, they have been pleased to im- 
pose on me the melancholy task of communicating 
their proceedings to the Bench, and conveying to it 
their sense of the loss which society and the Profession 
have sustained in the death of the late Francis Scott 
Key. I cannot but be deeply conscious of the disad- 
vantages under which I labor in acquitting myself in 
this presence of the duty that has been confided to me. 



266 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

My acquaintance with the excellent man whose sudden 
death, in the midst of a career of eminent usefulness, 
public and private, and of the most active devotion to 
the great interests of humanity, we are now called to 
deplore, was until a recent period extremely limited ; 
but short as was my personal intercourse with him, it 
was quite long enough to endear him to me in a pecu- 
liar manner, as one of the most gentle, guileless, amiable, 
and attractive beings, with whom, in an experience suf- 
ficiently diversified, it has ever been my good fortune to 
act. Ardent, earnest, indefatigable in the pursuits of 
his objects and the performance of his duties, eloquent 
as the advocate of whatever cause he embraced, because 
his heart was true and his sympathy cordial and suscep- 
tible; decided in his own conduct without one particle 
of censoriousness or acerbity towards others, and with 
the blandest manners, the most affectionate temper, the 
considerate toleration of dissent, the most patient acqui- 
esence in the decisions of authority, even where he had 
most strenuously exerted himself to prevent them. 

" His life seemed to me a beautiful pattern of all that 
is lovely, winning and effective, in the charity of a 
Christian gentleman. I say effective for his was no 
* fugitive and cloistered' virtue which gave no offence, 
because it shunned all contest, and maintained its purity 
only by avoiding the contaminations of the world. He 
lived, on the contrary, in the very midst of the passions, 
the struggles, and the warfare of active and even public 
life. He was always in the heat and dust of the arena, 
armed and equipped for the conflict; he omitted no op- 
portunity of doing good, which either chance or design 
offered him; a».d his patriotism and his philanthropy 
vied with each other in turning to account every moment 
of his time which was not engrossed in the cares of his 
fireside or the business of his profession. I remember, 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 267 

with melancholy pleasure, that the very last conversa- 
tion which I held with him turned on a project, of what 
he believed to be the most extensive usefulness, which 
had warmed his heart with enthusiastic hopes for his 
country and for mankind. 

"Of the manner in which he discharged his profes- 
sional duties, your Honors, are, on every account, the 
most competent witnesses. You know his fidelity to 
his engagements; his punctuality in attendance at his 
post ; how laborious he was in the preparation of his 
cases; how full of resources in the management of a 
cause; how ready, how fertile, how ingenious in the 
invention and discussion of his topics. Your Honors 
are, therefore, fully prepared to receive and confirm the 
testimony which his brethren of the Bar have been eager 
to bear to the virtues and abilities that adorned him, 
and in compliance with the request I have now the 
honor of submitting them." 

At the annual meeting of the Colonization Society, 
in Washington, during the month of February, 1843, 
Mr. Z. 0. Lee, of Baltimore, offered the following : 

" R-isolcei, That the sudden decease of Francis S. 
Key, Esq., one of the founders, for many years a mem- 
ber of the Board of Managers, and more recently a 
Vice-President of this society, has deprived the institu- 
tion of one of its strongest supports." 

The death of Mr. Key is thus referred to in one of 
the public prints of that date : 

"The sudden decease of this gentleman, so virtuous 
in all the social and public relations of life, so eminent 
for talents and philanthropy, so consecrated in all his 
thoughts and feelings to truth and duty, so admired 
and beloved by the community of which he was a citi- 
zen, and which had derived benefits invaluable from his 
efforts and example, has prostrated us with the weight 



268 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

of a dark and general calamity. All have experienced 
a loss, and many, one which they cannot hope will be 
repaired. Mr. Key was one of the founders of the Ameri- 
can Colonization Society, long an efficient manager in its 
proceedings, at all times its steadfast, generous and 
eloquent friend, and often has the cause of the Society, 
in times of depression and trial, been raised, guarded 
and advanced by his vigorous and indefatigable exer- 
tions. The speech made by him during the last 
summer, before a convention of the friends of African 
colonization, and published in the July number of the 
Kepository, was the most eloquent he ever delivered, 
seldom equaled on any subject, and more seldom, if 
ever, surpassed. It was worthy of a lofty Christian 
mind, endued with the original conceptions and 
enriched with the treasures of human learning, and 
of a divine philosophy. In the charms of his 
taste, conversation and manners, in his habits of 
thought and action, Mr. Key much resembled Mr. 
Wilberforce, nor would his influence have been less had 
he lived in similar circumstances, and moved in as 
elevated and wide a sphere. He sought not fame, but 
his fame is securely written, never to be obliterated, on 
the flag of his country, and engraven upon the heart 
of Africa." 

Mr. Key is buried in Mount Olivet Cemetery, at 
Frederick city, Maryland, not far from the place of his 
birth, and within sight of the Catoctin Mountain. 

The Poet has shown the depth of his religious fervor, 
the love for his Creator and the purity of His " glow- 
ing heart," in the hymns so familiar to Episcopalians. 
His sacred songs reveal the sincerity of his soul, and 
show us how far above the stars of his beloved banner 
he soared in the contemplation of divine mercy and for- 
giveness. Where may be found a more eloquent expres- 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 261i 

sion of profound humility — that humility that, in 
bending to the omnipotent will of God, rises in grand 
distinction to the Pagan pride of the unbeliever : 

"Lord this bosom's ardent feeling 

Vainly would my lips express ; 
Low before Thy foot-stool kneeling, 

Deign Thy suppliant's prayer to bless; 
Let Thy grace, my soul's chief treasure, 

Love's pure flame within me raise; 
And, since words can never measure, 

Let my life show forth Thy praise." 

Among the hymns sung in the Episcopal Church for 
over thirty years is this one, written by Francis Scott 
Key: 

Hymn 150. 

Lord, with glowing heart I'd praise Thee 

For the bliss Thy love bestows ; 
For the pardoning grace that saves me, 

And the peace that from it flows ; 
Help, O God, my weak endeavor, 

This dull soul to rapture raise; 
Thou must light the flame, or never 

Can my love be warmed to praise. 

Praise my soul, the God that sought thee, 

Wretched wanderer, far astray ; 
Found thee lost, and kindly brought thee 

From the paths of death away ; 
Praise with love's devoutest feeling, 

Him who saw thy guilt-born fear, 
And, the light of hope revealing, 

Bade the blood-stained cross appear. 

Lord, tliis bosom's ardent feeling 

Vainly would my lips express; 
Low before Thy foot-stool kneeling, 

Deign Thy suppliant's prayer to bless; 
Let Thy grace, my soul's chief treasure, 

Love's pure flame within me raise ; 
And, since words can never measure, 

Let my life show forth Thy praise. 



270 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

The following extract from a letter, dated Baltimore, 
July 25th, 1875, proves beyond doubt the reputation of 
Mr. Key as a lawyer and a statesman. The writer of it 
is the distinguished Maryland lawyer, the Hon. Reverdy 
Johnson: 

" My acquaintance wilh Mr. Key commenced some twenty 
years before his death, and soon ripened into friendship. I have 
argued cases with him and against him in the Courts of Mary- 
land and in the United States Supreme Court. He had evidently 
been a diligent legal student, and being possessed of rare ability, 
he became an excellent lawyer. In that particular, however, he 
would, I have no doubt, have been more pr» found but for his 
fondness' for elegant literature, and particularly for poetry. 

"In this last, he was himself quite a proficient. Some of his 
writings are truly gems of beauty. His style of speaking to a 
Court was ever clear, and his reasoning logical and powerful; 
whilst his speeches to juries, when the occasion admitted of it, 
were beautifully eloquent. To the graces of his many accom- 
plishments he possessed what is still more to his praise, a char- 
acter of almost religious perfection. A firm believer in the 
Christian dispensation, his conduct was regulated by the doc- 
trines inculcated by its founder, and this being so his life was one 
of perfect purity 

" As has often been said of lawyers, however, it may be said of 
him that his forensic efforts, however admirable, will exist only 
in tradition. But he had the rare good fortune to write a national 
song, which, from the day of its first appearance, has warmed 
the heart and animated the patriotism of every American, and 
will cause the name of Francis Scott Key to live forever. 
" I remain, with regard, 

" Your friend and obedient servant, 

REVERDY JOHNSON." 

One of the most earnest of Mr. Key's friends was 
John Randolph, of Roanoke, Virginia's noted states- 
man. Notwithstanding the disparity ot age between 
them, Randolph's devotion to Key was of the most en- 
thusiastic nature. The friendship of this strange man 
was exalted into a sentiment, the purest perhaps of 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 271 

which he was capable. Too deep a study of those 
works of English and French writers, rendered con- 
spicious by infidelity to the Source of Truth, had 
darkened his mind and led his heart astray. He ac- 
knowledged to Mr. Key the disturbed state of his soul, 
overshadowed by the one only unforgivable sin — despair. 
Mr. Key had the happiness, the noblest of happiness, 
to lead him into a train of reading and reflection that 
brought him into the perfect light of Christianity — 
Faith. During frequent interviews with Mr. Key in 
Washington, and in his letters when separated from his 
friend, the subject of religion was discussed. In writ- 
ing to Mr. Key from Virginia, Mr. Randolph called the 
attention of his correspondent to an infidel work, in re- 
ply to which Mr. Key writes, January 20th, 1814 : 

"I can hearnothing of the book you meation. . . 
I would read it, and give you my opinion of it, if I came 
across it, provided it was not too long. I don't believe 
there are any new objections to be discovered to the 
truth of Christianity, though there may be some art in 
presenting old ones in a new dress. My faith has been 
greatly confirmed by the infidel writers I have read, 
and I think such would be the effect upOn any one who 
has examined the evidences. Our church recommends 
their perusal to students of divinity, which shows she is 
not afraid of them. 

" Men may argue ingeniously against our faith — as, 
indeed, they may against anything — but what can they 
say in defense of their own ? I would carry the war 
into their own territories. I would ask them what they 
believed. If they said they believed anything, I think 
that thing might be shown to be more full of difficul- 
ties and liable to infinitely greater objections than the 
system they opposed, and they more credulous and un- 
reasonable for believing it. If they said they believed 



272 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

nothing, you could not, to be sure, have anything further 
to say to them. In that case they would be insane, or, 
at best, illy qualified to teach others what they ought 
to believe or disbelieve. 

" I can never doubt (for we have the word of God for 
it, and it is so plainly a consequence of His goodness,) 
that all who inquire with that sincerity and earnest- 
ness which so awful a subject requires, will find the 
truth. ' Seek, and ye shall find.' Did you ever read 
' Grotius de Veritate ? ' I should like to see an infidel 
attempt an answer to that book." 

Mr. Randolph, on the the 17th of February, 1814, in 
answer to Mr. Key's letter, wrote: 

"Dear Frank:— You plead want of time, and I 
may, with equal truth, declare that I have nothing 
worth twelve and a half cents, which I believe is the 
postage from here to the city of "Washington. Indeed, 
I have been living myself in ' a world without souls/ 
until my heart is ' as dry as a chip,' and as cold as a 
dog's nose. Do not suppose, however, that the Jew 
Book has made any impression upon me, as I cannot see 
how the human mind, unassisted by the light of Chris- 
tianity, can stop half-way at Deism, instead of travel- 
ing the whole length to which fair deduction would 
lead it, to frozen, cheerless Atheism; so it appears to 
me the most wonderful, that any man believing in the 
Old Testament can reject the New ; and it is, perhaps, 
not the least conclusive of the proofs of the authen- 
ticity of the latter, that the Jews, admitting as it were 
the premises, should blindly reject the inevitable con- 
clusions." 

In the correspondence of many years continuance, the 
subject of religion was, as may be supposed, not the 
only matter discussed. In one of his letters, Mr. Ran- 
dolph asks : " Have you read Lord Byron's Giaour ? I 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 273 

have been delighted with it. He is a poet, as was em- 
phatically said of Patrick Henry, ' He is an orator/ " 

In answer, Mr. Key wrote: "I have not seen the 
Giaour, but have looked over the Bride of Abyclos. It 
has some fine passages in it, but it is too full of those 
crooked-named, out-of-the-way East Indian things. I 
have long ago, however, resolved that there shall be no 
such poet as Walter Scott as long as he lives, and I can 
admire nobody who pretends to rival him." 

In a letter written by Mr. Key previous to the above, 
he thus expresses himself: "As to Walter Scott, I have 
always thought he was sinking in every successive work, 
He is sometimes himself again in 'Marmion/ and the 
'Lady of the Lake/ but when I read these, and 
thought of the 'Lay of 'the Last Minstrel/ it always 
seemed to me that ' hushed was the harp — the minstrel 
gone.' I believe I am singular in this preference, and 
it maybe that I was so ' spell-bound ' by 'the witch 
notes 7 of the first, that I could never listen to the 
others. But does it not appear, that to produce one 
transcendantly fine epic poem is as much as has ever 
fallen to the life of one man ? There seems to be a law 
of the Muses for it. I was always provoked with him 
for writing more than the first. The top of Parnassus 
is a point, and there he was, and should have been con- 
tent. There was no room to saunter about on it; if he 
moved, he must descend ; and so it has turned out, and 
he is now (as the Edinburgh reviewers say of poor 
Montgomery), 'wandering about on the lower slopes of 
it/ " At this time, Sir Walter Scott was not known as 
a novelist. 

In one of his letters to Mr. Eandolph, dated October 

5th, 1&13, Mr. Key says : " I cannot think that the duty 

of an honest man, when he consents to be a politician, 

is so difficult and hopeless as you seem to consider it. 

23 



274 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

He will often, it is true, be wrong, but this may enable 
him to correct his errors. He will often have to submit 
to disappointments, but they may make him better and 
wiser. If he pursues his course conscientiously, guard- 
ing against his own ambition, and exercising patience 
and forbearance towards others, he will generally suc- 
ceed better than the most artful intriguer, and the 
worst that can happen is that in bad and distempered 
times he may be released from his obligations. Nor 
even then is there an end to his usefulness ; for, besides 
many things that he may yet do for the common good, 
the public disorder may pass away, and when the people 
are sobered by suffering they will remember who would 
have saved them from it, and his consequence and abil- 
ity to serve them will be incalculably increased, and 
their confidence in him unbounded." Mr. Randolph 
had been left out of Congress by his constituents because 
of his opposition to the war with England, and these 
remarks of Mr. Key were meant for him. 

Mr. Justice Story, of the Supreme Court of the United 
States, in a letter to Chief Justice Taney, dated at Cam- 
bridge, Massachusetts, March 25, 1843, wrote: "I was 
exceedingly grieved in hearing of the death of poor Key. 
His excellent talents, his high morals, his warm and 
active benevolence, and his most amiable and gentle 
temper endeared him to all who knew him. To you 
and Mrs. Taney the loss is irreparable, and to the pub- 
lic, in the truest sense of the word, a deep calamity. 
* Our dying friends come o'er us like a cloud.' Jones is 
almost the only one left at the bar who was there when 
I first knew the Court ; and it is sad to know how many 
glorious lights have been extinguished." 



francis scott key. 2^5 

Extracts from a Discourse on Education, deliv- 
ered in Saint Anne's Church, Annapolis, after 
the Commencement of Saint John's College, 
February 22nd, 1827, by Francis S. Key, Esq,. 
Alumnus of Saint John's College. 
"A government administered for the benefit of all, 
should provide all practicable means of happiness for 
all. It must also provide useful citizens, competent to 
the discharge of the various services the public interests 
may require. Education confers happiness and useful- 
ness, and therefore demands attention. No maxim is 
more readily admitted than that a wise and free govern- 
ment should provide for the education of its citizens ; 
but the maxim seems not to be admitted to its just 
extent. A State affords to the poor or laboring class of 
its population the means of obtaining a common edu- 
cation, such an one as prepares them for the ordinary 
duties of their situation, and of which alone they can 
generally avail themselves, who can give but a small 
portion of their time and none of their means to such 
pursuits. And it is too generally thought that this is 
enough, that the State has discharged its duty, and that 
what remains to be done to fit men for higher degrees 
of happiness and usefulness, and to qualify them for a 
wider sphere of duty, may be left to itself. 

" But it is not enough. More, far more can be don e 
even for those for whose benefit what is done is in- 
tended, as I shall hereafter show. And what is done 
for the other numerous and important classes of the 
community? And why are they to be neglected ? In 
all political societies there will be men of different con- 
ditions and circumstances. They cannot be all limited 
by the same necessities, nor destined to the same em- 
ployments. Nor is it desirable, nor, from the nature of 
things, possible that it should be so. If they could be 



276 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

reduced to the same level they could not be kept to it. 
Idleness and vice would sink below it — honorable effort 
would rise above it. 

" There are and ever will be the poor and the rich, 
the men of labor and the men of leisure, and the State 
which neglects either neglects a duty, and neglects it 
at its peril, for which ever it neglects will be not only 
useless but mischievous. 

" It is admitted that the neglect of one of these classes 
is unjust and impolitic. Why is it not so as to the other ? 
If it is improper to leave the man of labor uneducated, 
deprived of the means of improvement he can receive 
and requires, is it not at least equally so to leave the man 
of leisure, whose situation does not oblige him to labor, 
and who therefore will not labor, to rust in sloth or 
to riot in dissipation ? 

"If there be any difference, it is more impolitic to 
neglect the latter, for he has more in his power either 
for good or evil, will be more apt, from his greater temp- 
tations, to be depraved himself and the corrupter of the 
others. 

"This neglect would be peculiarly unwise in a Gov- 
ernment like ours. Luxury is the vice most fatal to 
republics, and idleness and want of education in the 
rich promote it in its most disgusting forms. Nor let it 
be thought that we have no cause to guard against this 
evil. It is, perhaps, the most imminent of our perils. 
While, therefore, I readily subscribe to the principle, 
which all admit, that it is essential in a free government 
that the whole population should be sufficiently in- 
structed to understand their rights, and be qualified for 
their duties, and that for this purpose such an educa- 
tion as their situation will enable them to receive should 
be provided for all; yet I will not fear to maintain 
(what is not so generally admitted), and that it is just 






FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 277 

as essential to a wise and proper administration of such 
a government that there should be found among its 
citizens men of more exalted attainments, who can give 
their whole youth and their whole lives to the highest 
pursuits of every department of useful science. 

"Nor is it only as a refuge from the dangers of youth 
that such an institution is to be regarded. It is to give 
strength and preparation for the whole life. It is then 
that habits, principles and tastes that fix the color of 
succeeding years are to be formed. Then are the victo- 
ries to be achieved over the temper and disposition, 
over the temptations from within and from without, 
that make the man the master of himself through life. 
Patience in investigation, accuracy of research, perse- 
verance in labor, resolution to conquer difficulty, zeal 
in the cause of learning and virtues, are then to be ac- 
quired. Then is Science to display her charms, and 
Literature her delights, and a refined and exalted taste 
to lure him, by higher gratifications, from the vain 
pleasures of the world. Then is he to be made familiar 
with the sages and heroes of antiquity, to catch the in- 
spiration of their genius and their virtues ; and the 
great and the good of every age and of every land are to 
be made his associates, his instructors, his examples. 

"Will not a grateful sense of these benefits heighten 
the ardor of his patriotism, and will he not serve a 
country that cherished and adorned his youth with 
more devotion, as well as with far more ability ? It 
may be that love of country springs from some unde- 
finable and hidden instinct of our nature, wisely given 
to the heart of man to fit him for the filial duties which 
he owes to the land of his birth. But this impulse, 
however pure and high its origin, must submit to the 
23* 



278 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

common destiny of all human affections. It may glow 
with increasing ardor, elevate itself above all our de- 
sires, and reign the ruling passion of the soul. And 
it may grow cold, languish and expire. A country, like 
a parent, should meet this instinctive feeling of her 
children with a corresponding affection ; should call it 
forth to early and continual exercise by early and con- 
tinual blessings, by setting before them illustrious 
examples, and all the high rewards of virtue, and 
preparing them for all the enjoyments and duties of 
life. Such a country will not want patriots. 

" Maryland is a member of the American Confederacy, 
united with the other independent States in one General 
Government. It is her concern that her own political 
course should be directed by wisdom, and for this she 
must necessarily look to her own citizens. It is also 
and equally her concern that the General Government 
should be wisely administered, and with a just regard 
to her own peculiar interests. She must furnish her 
quota ot talent there. Her duty to the Union requires 
this, her own preservation demands it. It is not enough 
for her that there should be found there wisdom and 
talent, and patriotism; but she must see to it that 
Maryland wisdom and talent, and patriotism, are found 
there. There is a great common interest among these 
States, a bond of union strong enough, we all hope, to 
endure the occasional conflicts of subordinate local 
interests. ^ But there are and ever will be these interests, 
and they will necessarily produce collision and competi- 
tion. Hence will continually arise questions of great 
national concern, and more or less, according to their 
respective interests, of vital importance to the States. 
These are all to be considered, discussed and settled. 
That they may be settled with justice to herself, Mary- 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 279 

land must meet this competition with all her strength. 
It is not in the number of her delegation that she is to 
trust. She may send one man who may be in himself 
a host. It is essential to her that her interest should 
be seen and felt, and that those who see and feel it should 
maintain it with all the poiver that talent and patriotism 
can wield. It is essential to her, and to every member 
of the Union, that the agitations excited by these colli- 
s'ons should be kept from endangering the foundations 
upon which the fabric of our free institutions has been 
reared — that men of the highest poivers and the purest 
principles should rule the deliberations of our national 
councils on these occasions of difficulty and danger, and 
preserve, through every storm that may assail it, the 
Union — the Ark of our safety. 

" It is no reproach to the wisdom of those who framed 
our Constitution that they have left it exposed to dan- 
ger from the separate interests and powers of the States. 
It is not to be avoided but by incurring far greater 
dangers. Nor is our situation in that respect without 
its advantages. These local interests are powerful ex- 
citements to the States to prepare and enrich their pub- 
lic men with the highest possible endowments. Their 
own immediate interest would afford a more constant 
and powerful stimulus to do this than one more remote, 
and felt only in common, which too often leaves its 
share of duty to others. But for this, a general degen- 
eracy in talent and principle might prevail, and the 
great concerns of a growing Nation sink into hands un- 
fitted to sustain them. If Providence shall preserve us 
from these dangers and give perpetuity to our institu- 
tions, Maryland will continue to see an increasing ne- 
cessity (if she would avail herself of a just share of the 
benefits they are designed to confer) for calling forth 
and cultivating all her resources. And if this hope 



280 FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 

fails us, if the Union is dissolved, in the distractions and 
dangers that follow, she will, if possible, still more 
require the highest aid that the wisdom of her sons can 
afford to guide her through that night of darkness. 

" Let it also be remembered that every well taught 
citizen, whatever may be his condition, to whatever 
station in life he may belong, is, generally speaking, an 
advantage to the public. Therefore, although but a 
small number, in proportion to the whole population, 
may be qualified for higher usefulness by the acquisi- 
tions of learning, yet among them may be found some 
whom the State may proudly reckon as her greatest 
ornaments — to whom she may be indebted even for her 
preservation. The Eoman historian, who records the 
effect produced upon the Roman Senate by the prudence 
and eloquence of Cato, upon an occasion of imminent 
peril to the Republic, shows how powerfully he was 
impressed by the consideration of what one man might 
accomplish for the welfare of a nation. 

"Let not this filial duty be delayed. Death has al- 
ready thinned your ranks. Your eldest brethren (Alex- 
ander, Oarr, Lomax,) have run their brief but honorable 
course, and are no more. He, too, who had caught 
within that hall the bold spirit of the ancient eloquence 
from its mightiest master; who, if he had been spared 
to stand before you this day would have roused you 
from your seats, and called you to join your hearts and 
hands in a sacred covenant to restore its honors — St. 
Johns — and to swear to its fulfillment by the memory 
of the dead, the hopes of the living, and the glory of 
unborn generations. He, (John Hanson Thomas, of 
Frederick city), alas ! is a light shining no more upon 
the earth. He, also, who excelled in all the attainments 



FRANCIS SCOTT KEY. 281 

of mind, and charmed with all the attractions of virtue ; 
who could descend at will from the highest soaring in 
the regions of Fancy, and be found foremost in the 
steepest ascents of the paths of Science; he who had 
here caught 

' the glow, 
The warmth divine that poet's know,' 

and whose lyre, upon a theme that touched these scenes 
of his inspiration, would have poured forth its most 
impassioned strains, and compelled the hearts that elo- 
quence could not subdue to bow to the magic of his 
song. He, too, the ornament of St. John's, and the 
leader of her tenth legion, (John Shaw, M. D., of An- 
napolis), has had our tears, and sleeps not in an honored 
grave but beneath the wave of the ocean. 

"Nor can he be forgotten, (Henry M. Murray, of An- 
napolis), the last, but not least lamented of our departed 
brethren, who would have been among the foremost to 
offer the feelings of a warm heart and the powers of a 
gifted mind to the labors to which I have invited you. 
Who had already done so, and stands enrolled .in the 
records of the College, among those who repaid, by their 
counsels at her board, the honors she had bestowed. 
Whose zeal and ability would have performed more than 
his share of the duty, while his unassuming and gener- 
ous nature would have refused any portion of the praise. 
The awful Providence which removed him, in the midst 
of life and usefulness, from the profession he adorned, 
the society he blessed, and the friends he delighted, has 
called upon our College to mourn the double loss of an 
honored son and a devoted patron. But it becomes us 
not to murmur under this mysterious dispensation — 
rather to be thankful that it has left to console and 
animate us a cherished memory and a high example." 



BIRD-SONG. 



By W. L. Shoemaker, 



COME hither— oh, come hither! 
Were the words that I heard ringing 

On a sunny day of May, 
When the flowers around were springing 
And the earth was green and gay, 
From a tiny bird above, 
Who was calling to his love — 
Who was longiDg to be with her 
On that sunny day of May ; 
Calling, calling, loudly calling, 
Come hither — oh, come hither!— 
Come hither ! 

Come hither— oh, come hither! 
I was walking sad and lonely, 
O'er the hills and far away, 
Meditating of one only, 
Who is fairer than the May ; 
And anon my weary heart 
In the carol took a part;, 
It was longing to be with her, 
O'er the hills and far away, 
Calling, calling, ever calling, 
Come hither — oh, come hither !— 
Come hither ! 



BIRD-SONG. 283 



Come hither— ob, come hither! 
And the singer's mate hied to him, 

That she love for love might pay ; 
'Mid a thousand birds she knew him, 
As she knew his silver lay. 

Though the maiden I adore 
Was as far off as before, 
I was longing to be with her, 

That she love for love might pay; 
Calling, calling, vainly calling, 
Come hither — oh, come hither! — 
Come hither ! 

Georgetown, D. C. 





AMELIA B. WELBY. 




" The magic of the lyre's uuteachable 
As music of the spheres : 
It is the inborn fire of soul's elect." — Stella. 

F this writer, Edgar A. Poe says : (though due 
allowance is to be made for his overmastering 
prejudices.) 

"Mrs. Amelia Welby has nearly all the 
imagination of Maria del Occidente with a more refined 
taste ; and nearly all the passion of Mrs. Norton, with 
a nicer ear, and (what is surprising) equal art. Very 
few American poets are at all comparable with her in 
the true poetic qualities. As for our poetesses, (an ab- 
surd but necessary word) few approach her." In this, 
Poe asserts overmuch. The melodious flow of musical 
words like the summer-song of a wood-brook is always 
noticeable in the poems of Amelia B. Welby. Her song 
is clear and bird-like; her Fancy, pure and free, floats on 
unsullied wings beneath a blue sky never darkened by a 
cloud. Mrs. Norton's nature is nearer akin to the 
ocean, while in fancy she soars rather than floats. 

It is, of course, preferable to the teller of a story that 
the heroine thereof be superior to the heroines of all 
other stories, yet facts cannot be honestly denied. To 
claim for Mrs. Welby "equal art" with Mrs. Norton, 
is an injustice to the latter. Save that they are both 
worshipers at the shrine of the Muses, little else can be 



AMELIA B. WELBY. 285 

found in common between them. The English poet, 
whose sad strong words return and haunt us, 
" Like echoes that have lost themselves among the distant hills," 
mounts higher and nearer to that shrine, as her thoughts 
and will partake more of the rock-bound heights on 
which it stands. 

Amelia B. Welby was born on the 3d of February, 
1819, at the village of Saint Michael's, on the Miles 
river, Talbot county, Maryland. Her father's name was 
Coppuck. He was an ingenius journeyman mechanic, 
who hammered and toiled through the live-long day, 
while the unconscious baby-poet slept peacefully in its 
humble cradle. While Amelia was still an infant, she 
was taken to the neighborhood of Baltimore city, where 
she remained until 1834 ; from thence, Destiny led the 
way to Louisville, Kentucky, where she first became 
known as a poetess. Of this sweet child of the Muses, 
Ben Casseday says : " Her education was not thorough, 
her mind was not disciplined by study, nor was her 
reading at all extensive ; yet in spite of all these disad- 
vantages, her poetry is perfect in rythm and harmony, 
and is never blemished by any fault either of Khetoric or 
of Grammar. In the most impressible part of her ear- 
lier life she was surrounded by a great deal that was 
grand and beautiful in Nature, and most of her poetic 
images refer to those surroundings. Her first publica- 
tion was in 1837, she being then hardly eighteen years 
old." 

George D. Prentice, the editor of the Louisville Jour- 
nal, a great-hearted gentleman, gave, like the poet 
Bryant, welcome to " blithe new comers." He desired 
that the young genius of his country should be devel- 
oped, and to this end gave all aid within his power. 
The success of "Amelia's" writings was marked, yet it 
is to be feared that the charm that won for them the 
24 



286 AMELIA B. WELBY. 

popular fa-vor of that day would scarcely be recognized 
as generally in 1875. Of this charm Mr. Casseday says : 

"The sweetness and naturalness of her melodies 
caught every ear and warmed every heart. They reached 
all the better feelings of her readers, because they so 
evidently flowed fresh from her own. Her poetry was 
the result of a pure afflatus, and had never been meas- 
ured by the frigid rules of art. She sang because it 
was given her to sing ; her melodies were like the voices 
of the birds — they were the simple outgu siring of her 
own pure nature. She did not reach the higher forms 
of art, nor did she attempt them. Her song was a sim- 
ple measure, learned of the trill of the brooklet, of the 
rustle of the leaves, or of the deep and solemn murmur 
of the ocean." 

In June, 1838, Miss Coppuck became the wife of 
Geo. Welby, Esq., a prominent merchant of Louisville. 

The first edition of her poems appeared in Boston in 
1845. In 1846 the Appletons published a second edi- 
tion, and many new editions have appeared since that 
time. Of her personal appearance Mr. Casseday writes : 

"Mrs. Welby was rather above than below the mid- 
dle height. Slender and exceedingly graceful in form, 
with exquisite taste in dress, and a certain easy, floating 
sort of movement, she would at once be recognized as a 
beautiful woman. 

" A slight imperfection in the upper lip, while it 
prevented her face from being perfect, yet gave a pecu- 
liar piquancy to its expression which was far from de- 
stroying any of its charms. Her hair was exquisitely 
beautiful, and was always arranged, regardless of the 
prevailing fashion, with singular elegance and adapta- 
tion to her face and figure. Her manners were simple, 
natural and impulsive, like those of a child. Her con- 
versation, though sometimes frivolous, was always 



AMELIA B. WELBY. 287 

charming. Her social life was full of innocent gaiety 
and playfulness." 

The moon witlrin our casement beams, 
Our blue-eyed babe bath dropped to sleep, 

And I have left it to its dreams 
Amid the shadows deep, 

To muse beside the silver tide, 

Whose waves are rippling at thy side. 

It is a still and lovely spot 

Where they have laid thee down to rest; 
Tbe white rose and forget-me-not 

Bloom sweetly on thy breast, 
And birds and streams with liquid lull 

Have made the stillness beautiful. 

• 

And softly through tbe forest bars 
Ligbt lovely shapes on glossy plumes, 

Float ever in, like winged stars, 
Amid the purpling glooms; 

Their sweet songs borne from tree to tree, 

Thrill the light leaves with melody. 

Alas! the very path I trace, 
In happier hours thy footstep made; 

This spot was once thy resting place; 
Within the silent shade 

Thy white hand trained the fragrant bough 

That drops its blossoms o'er thee now. 

Of this p3em, only partly given here, Poe has taken 
especial notice in his " Literati." Quite an elaborate 
criticism on this single poem terminates thus : "Upon 
the whole, there are some poets in America (Bryant 
and Sprague for example) who equal Mrs. Welby in the 
negative merits of that limited versification which they 
chiefly affect — the iambic pentameter — but none equal 
her in the richer and positive merits of rhythmical 
variety, conception — invention. They, in the old rou- 



288 AMELTA B. WELBY. 

tine, rarely err. She often surprises, and always delights, 
by novel, rich and accurate combination of the ancient 
musical expressions." 

Her imagination did not wander alone uncurbed in 
the realms of Poetry. She descended sometimes to the 
more practical prose, yet the following has little of the 
practical save in the sound of the name. This, too, is 
contributed by Ben Casseday in " The Ladies' Keposi- 
tory:" 

" She had been visited at her residence by a party of 
gay masqueraders, among whom was a very intimate 
friend costumed as a Turk, and bearing the euphonious 
soubriquet of Hamet Ali Ben Khorassen. On the day 
after this visit Mrs. Welby received from this pseudo 
Pashaw a note of farewell, written in the redundant 
style of the Orientals, to which the following is her 
answer : 

" Although a stranger to the graceful style of Oriental 
greeting, Amelia, the daughter of the Christian, would 
send to Hamet Ali Ben Khorassen, ere he departs from 
the midst of her people, a few words in token of farewell, 
and also in acknowledgment of the flowery epistle sent 
by the gallant Ben Khorassen to the * Bulbul of the 
Giaour Land,' as he is pleased, in the poetical language 
of his country, to designate the humblest of his admir- 
ers! Like the sudden splendor of a dazzling meteor, 
gleaming before the delighted eye of the startled gazer, 
was the brief sojourn of the noble Ben Khorassen in the 
presence of the happy ' Bulbul.' He came before her 
uniting in his aspect the majesty of a god of old with 
the mien of a mortal — graceful in his step, winning in 
his words, yet ' terrible as an army with banners.' The 
song of the ' Bulbul ' was hushed ; the words of greeting 
died upon her lip. But now that the mightiest of the 
mighty has withdrawn from her dazzled gaze the glory 



AMELIA B. WELBY. 289 

of his overpowering presence, the trembling 'Bulbiil' 
lifts her head once more like a drooping flower oppressed 
by the too powerful rays of the noontide sun ; and in 
the midst of the gloom that overshadows her, recalls to 
mind every word and look of the gallant Ben Khorassen, 
till her thoughts of him arise like stars upon the hori- 
zon of her memory, lighting up the gloom of his absence, 
and glittering upon the waters of the fountain of her 
heart, whose every murmur is attuned to the music of 
his memory. 

" But the bark of liamet Ali Ben Khorassen floats 
upon the waters with her white wings spread for the 
clime of the crescent. Her brilliant pennon streams 
from the strand, and the words of the ' Bulbnl ' must 
falter into a farewell. May the favoring gales of para- 
dise, fragrant as the breath of houris, fill the silken sails 
of Ben Khorassen, and waft him onward to his native 
groves of citron and of myrtle, waking thoughts in his 
bosom fresh and fragrant as the flowers that cluster in 
his clime! Thus prays Amelia, the daughter of the 
Christian, and the ' Bulbul of the Giaour Land !' Fare- 
well !" 

Her recognition of the talents of others of her day 
and time, proves a generous nature. To Stella, the 
young author of " The Eecords of the Heart," she wrote 
as follows : 

" I love you though I have never seen you. You have 
genius and will make a great name. That is the hope 
of the ambitious poet, but I would rather have the love 
of one high great soul than all the literary fame the 
world can bestow." 

In this acknowledgment of a good and lovely woman 

to a younger writer, whose work was but just begun, 

how much may not be due in the aid that kindly words 

give to the young pilgrim ? The genius of " Stella" 

24* 



290 



AMELIA B. WELBY 



in the year 1875, irradiates the page of the life-drama of 
Sappho, the poet of Mytilene. 

In the month of May, 1852, amid its tender blossoms 
and softest songs, she, whose brief story is here given, 
sped away into a land of eternal beauty, whose peace 
" passeth all understanding." 




THE WATCH. 



By Frances Marie Cole. 



LONG on the slipping shingles at high tide 
I watched the coming of your tardy sail- 
Scanning the world of breakers wild and wide, 
Until the sunset fires burned low and pale. 

At last the hoarded sands lost glint and gold, 
And stretched in ghastly pallor far around, 

And distant on the waters gleaming cold, 

I heard the drogers singing, shoreward bound. 

'And sailing, a gailing," tbe song was one 

That told of gracious sea and tender wind, 

IIow her love's sail was speeding in the sun 
With calm before and not a cloud behind. 



Adown the coast the steady beacon-light 

Burned like a ruby in the light-house spire; 

Below, the thunderous sweeps, vexed, shuddering white, 
Were lit with broken threads of mocking fire. 

With wildest thoughts I filled the weary watch ; 

I wondered if kind heaven's brightest stars 
Had fallen earthward, if the waves would snatch 

A tithe that vanished on the harbor bars. 



292 THE WATCH. 

"He does not come" lamented thus the sea, 
And wailed of perils in a mad affright ; 
And when a vessel passed it seemed to be 

A phantom floating in the moonless night. 

No storms between, and still I thought of wreck, 
And pallid sleepers on the restless sand, 

Until afar I marked a flying speck, 

And knew your boat was bearing to the land. 

Safe to the shore at last ! O, drogers sing 
Again of gracious sea and tender wind, 

Of distant ships tbat love and prayer can bring 
With calm before and not a cloud behind ! 





FREDERICK PINKNEY. 




REDERICK PINKNEY was the fourth son 
of William Pinkney, the famous scholar and 
statesman. He was born the 14th of October, 
u 1804, on board the Brig Mary, on which his 
parents were returning from England to their native 
land. He gave proofs of a strong intellect at an early 



His education was obtained principally at the Balti- 
more College, under the direction at that time of Henry 
Knox, and at Saint Mary's College in Baltimore city, 
where he graduated in the year 1822. He pursued the 
study of Law under Judge Purviance, and was admitted 
to the Bar in the autumn of 1825. Though experienc- 
ing a severe loss in the death of his father, in 1822, he 
kept unerringly on his well-chosen way. 

The Hon. J. H. B. Latrobe, says of this "old- 
fashioned gentleman": "Without taking an active 
part in the current business of his profession, he has 
not left behind him his equal, certainly not his su- 
perior in the learning of Criminal Law. His accuracy 
in this connection was proverbial, nor was it his only 
accomplishment. Quiet and unassuming, one would 
hardly have imagined that the grave, white-bearded 
man, who, with his eyes fixed on the ground, with a 
portfolio under his arm, was as familiar to us all as he 



294 FREDERICK PINKNEY. 

passed with uncertain gait to and from his office, was 
a genial-tempered gentleman of a quaint and ready wit, 
fond of Art, not inapt himself in this particular, and 
possessing a rare fund of information on all subjects 
under the sun." 

When the announcement of his death was made in 
the Criminal Court, A. Leo Knott, Esq., said : 

" Duty was to him an exacting creditor to whom he 
made it a point of honor to owe nothing. Every man, 
says Bacon, is a debtor to his profession. It can be 
said, I think, of Frederick Pinkney, that when he died 
he had discharged all his obligations to it fully. But 
it was not only in the ranks of his profession as a 
lawyer that Mr. Pinkney labored and distinguished 
himself. He was an accomplished classical scholar. 
A graduate of Saint Mary's College in this city, he 
there imbibed that taste for Greek and Roman litera- 
ture that remained with him through life, that was the 
entertainment of his youth and manhood, and the 

solace of his age Of his heart, how 

shall I speak? Those who enjoyed his intimacy knew 
its worth, and will forever cherish agreeable and grate- 
ful recollections of his generosity, his unselfishness, his 
devotion to his family, his zeal for his friends, his in- 
corruptible honesty, his chivalric sense of honor." 

He was associated with his brother, Edward Coote 
Pinkney, in the publication of a paper known as the 
" Marylander," which paper soon ended its career. He 
was the editor of a newspaper called the " Chronicle," 
and the assistant editor of the "Baltimore Patriot." 
His many contributions to the journals and magazines 
of the day, were principally of a poetic nature. 

In strong contrast to the wild, restless spirit of his 
Poet-brother, the calm beauty of his muse reveals the 
high hope of his soul : 



FREDERICK PINKNEY. 295 

" As distant isles on kings bestow 

Some petty tribute, which is sent 
Not for its value, but to show 

How wide their empire has extent, 

" I send this little gift to thee, 

An offering to a sovereign fair, 
In token that I am not free 

From chains that all delight to wear." 

Could other than a poet have expressed so purely, 
yet so gracefully and earnestly the gentler feelings of 
his heart? 

Each and all of his poems express the depth of a 
pure and unsullied love, flowing unceasingly on to the 
goal of good and holy aims. 

Through all the nameless trials of life he retained in 
peace that wisdom of the heart that relies upon God, 
who " stilleth the noise of the seas, the noise of their 
waves, and the tumults of the people." 

On the 12th of December, 1862, he wrote : 

" Upon Moriah's Temple high 
Glittered the golden vine, 
With it earth's treasures could not vie 
Should kings their powers combine. 

" A single berry or a leaf 

Each worshipper bestowed , 
Till spreading wide in thick relief 
The pendant treasure glowed. 

" And thou, when earnest Duty draws 
And asks an offering slight, 
Wilt thou in pride refuse because 
Thy gift must be a mite ?" 

Mr. Pinkney was for many years one of the commis- 
sioners of the high courts of chancery, and after the 
abolition of that court he was made one of the com- 



296 FREDERICK PINKNEY. 

missioners of the Circuit Court of Baltimore, which 
office he held at the time of his death. He was ap- 
pointed as an assistant to the Attorney General and 
deputy Attorney General for Baltimore county under 
the administration of Attorney General Kichardson, 
and his suecessors, Mr. Gwinn, Mr. Whitney and Mr. 
Knott. The last-mentioned office he held for thirty 
years. 

In 1861 his sympathy with the movement of the 
Confederates caused him to resign his position of deputy 
to the State's Attorney. His great worth and unblem- 
ished integrity, however, induced his reappointment to 
the same office by Mr. Gwinn, in 186?. 

Like his distinguished father, he continued to the 
last days of his life the cultivation of his intellectual 
faculties, regarding what is termed the "finishing" of 
an education but as its beginning. 

He read and translated from the Greek authors 
almost daily, speaking that language, as well as the 
Latin, with great fluency. He was as familiar with the 
tongue of France as with English, and was perfectly 
conversant with the best French authors. 

His fondness for those old English authors, who were 
the leading writers in the days of his youth, never 
waned. The beauties of Thackeray and Dickens he 
failed to appreciate, which possibly may be counted 
amongst the peculiarities of his character for which he 
was noted. 

He was accomplished as an artist with the pencil and 
India-ink. He was also skillful as an engraver upon 
wood. 

He often regretted the lack of time that prevented 
him from devoting himself to the study of Chemistry 
and the natural sciences. 

He contemplated writing a history of Borne, also a 



FREDERICK PINKNEY. 297 

Digest of the Criminal Law of Maryland. These projects 
were never carried into effect, and any manuscripts pre- 
pared by him must have been destroyed previous to his 
death. 

Among the many who pressed forward to utter aloud 
their deep feelings of love and honor for the dead, were 
Sever dy Johnson and S. TeacMe Wallis ; and having 
enumerated his great talents and various accomplish- 
ments, they, with the many, concluded the record with 
a reference to what is most in worth in the history of a 
life : Bis love of God, his alms to the poor, his care of the 
helpless, and beyond all things, that general charity of 
word and deed, which " covereth a multitude of sins." 

A son of Mr. Pinkney having fought in the Army of 
the South, the following poem will possess for the reader 
a greater interest than it would otherwise have claimed. 
As the poet partly expresses in song what he could not 
tell in the ordinary language of Man, that which can 
never be fully told, may partly be understood : 

The Southern Matron to Her Son. 

I weep, as I leave you, with bitter emotion, 

Yet view me in kindness, refraining from blame, 
My tears are the tribute of anxious devotion, 

I would not withhold thee from duty and fame; 
When thy Country, in peril, has called thee to aid her, 

Though my heart may, at parting, with sadness o'erfiow, 
Yet undaunted go forth to meet the invader, 

I will not detain thee, oh, no, my Love, no I 

To the march and the battle, all heedless of danger, 

Be enduring and firm, and the foremost in fight, 
For the fair, sunny South, meet the hireling and stranger, 

And strike for thy Country, thy Home and thy Right. 
Away to the combat, lest Liberty perish, 

And proudly lead on in the charge on the foe, 
The fame of their Soldier the rescued shall cherish, 

They could not forget thee, oh, no, my Love, no ! 
25 



298 FREDERICK PINKNEY. 

The cheek may be pale, and the eye dimmed with sorrow, 

When the converse and view of the loved are denied, 
From our Cause and thy conduct I comfort shall borrow, 

I may grieve, but my grief will be tempered with pride; 
For the brow of the hero the laurel is braiding, 

And blessings aud praises the Land shall bestow, 
Thou soon shalt return decked with glory unfading , 

I will not detain thee, oh, no, my Love, no ! 

February 12t7i, 1862. 

Frederick Pinkney died June 13th, 1873, and was 
buried from the Church of Saint Barnabas, in Baltimore 
city. 







To S. 

DOST thou love me ? I heed not, though Fortune may lower, 
Though my friends may abandon, and foes may have power, 
From the thraldom of sorrow and care I am free, 
And I turn unrepining and smiling to thee. 

When forewarned that the enemy fain would surprise, 
To the strong mountain-fastness the fugitive hies, 
And he laughs as they clamor, pursuing in wrath, 
With the blood-hound loud baying too late on his path. 

There abundance is garnered, its walls are secure, 
And the deep well has springs both unfailing and pure, 
There the weary may rest, and the timid may hide, 
And the siege and assault may alike be defied. 

I have one who will follow in sunshine or shade, 
On whose faith I may venture and not be betrayed, 
Uncomplaining in evil, my fate thou wilt share, 
And warn me, and counsel, and save from despair. 

Frederick Pinkney. 

December 30ta, 1850. 




GEORGE H. MILES. 




MONGST her many poets, Maryland claims 
George Miles as one of her sweetest, if not 
her strongest singers. He was born in Balti- 
more city, on the 31st day of July, 1824. 
He was sent, at the age of nine years, to the College 
of Mount Saint Mary, at Emmittsburg, among the beau- 
tiful hills of the Blue Kidge. He graduated at eighteen. 
He entered the office of the Hon. J. H. B. Latrobe as a 
law student; yet the jealous Muse, with her tender woo- 
ing, drew him from the sterner pursuits of Life into the 
flower-strewn paths of Poetry. At the age of twenty he 
competed for the prize of $1,000, offered by Edwin For- 
rest, for a tragedy. His "play" of Mohammed was 
accepted by Mr. Forrest, and George Miles received the 
reward. This early success enticed him from the prac- 
tice of the Law. He wrote for J. E. Murdock, the actor, 
a play entitled " Hernando de Soto" which, as a stage 
piece, was deemed successful ; this was written about 
1850. In 1861 he wrote for Laura Keene, what was 
first known as " Uncle Sam's Magic Lantern," but was 
afterwards modified under the title of " The Seven Sis- 
ters." This ran for two years during the War, at Laura 
Keene's Theatre, in New York. He dramatized the 
story of " Elsie Venner," by Oliver Wendell Holmes ; 



GEORGE II. MILES. 301 

this however failed as a drama. A play written for Mr. 
John T. Ford, entitled " Senor Valiente" was brought 
out simultaneously in New York and Baltimore ; this 
failing in attracting the public, another followed, called 
" Mary's Birthday." The criticism upon the latter was 
favorable, yet a " poor house " greeted its appearance on 
the stage. 

George Miles, the poet, was not a dramatist, though 
he failed to perceive that his talents were misdirected. 
He wrote, meanwhile, many stories, which were gener- 
ally Catholic in tone and principle ; among them were 
"Loretto," "The Governess" and "The Truce of God." 
From the pages of the last named volume the follow- 
ing extracts are taken : 

"It is easy to reform where the passions are pampered, 
and the vicious heart of humanity pants wildly for the 
reformation ; but in the eleventh century the Church 
had gained a partial victory over the dearest appstites 
of the fiery Frank and the warlike Saxon. It was 
enacted, under pain of excommunication, that private 
warfare should cease from the sunset of Wednesday to 
the morning of Monday, and few were hardy enough to 
expose themselves to the penalty." 

The respite from hostilities which followed was called 
the " Truce of God." How well has the poet told the 
romance of a suffering day. Oh, blessed truce of God I 
that could in an age so far agone hold in check the 
ruthlessness, the arrogance, the " inhumanity to man " 
from man ! 

On page 71 of this pure beautiful little book, the 
author's seal is once more set: 

"It is not in the pride of health and youth, sur- 
rounded by pleasure and strangers to care, that a heart 
wedded to the world, is apt to prostrate itself in humility 
before the Author of Life ; but in danger and affliction, 
25* 



302 GEORGE II. MILES. 

we learn to mistrust our self-sufficiency, and feel our 
complete dependence upon an invisible and Almighty 
power. We are much more disposed to appeal to Heaven 
for protection than to return thanks for repeated 
favors." 

A few pages further on occurs this word-picture : 

"Upon the slope of the hill, half-way between the 
castle and the lake, was a chapel built of white stone, 
which had stood there, according to tradition, from the 
ninth century. It was said to have been erected by 
Charlemagne on his second expedition against the 
Saxons. The Baron of Hers had ornamented and re- 
paired it with much taste and at great expense, until it 
was celebrated throughout the circle of Suabia for its 
richness and elegance. It had been dedicated to Mary, 
the Morning Star, as appeared from a statue of the 
Blessed Virgin surmounted with a star, and was 
called the Pilgrim's Chapel. It was in charge of 
Herman, a priest who had studied at Monte C.issino, 
under the Benedictines, with Father Omehr, whom he 
loved like a brother. They had spent the long purga- 
tion and had been ordained together, and for forty years 
they had labored in the same vineyard side by side, and 
yet seldom meeting. When they did meet, however, it 
was with the joy and chastened affection which only the 
pure minded and truly religious can know." 

Should the reader of this page be a Catholic the fol- 
lowing will not seem lacking in interest. It tells of the 
excommunication of Henry IV, of Austria, by Pope 
Gregory VII. 

" Thus went forth this awful thunderbolt for the first 
time against a crowned head. A dissolute and ambi- 
tious monarch had called upon the successor of Saint 
Peter to yield up the keys, and lay the tiara at the feet 
of the Lion of Austria, because that successor had de- 



GEORGE H. MILES. 303 

clared an invincible determination to preserve the purity 
of the Church and its liberties at the sacrifice of life 
itself. The tyrant struck in anger, and the Pontiff, in- 
capable of yielding, gave the blow at last ; for the temple 
of religion was insulted and invaded. It is easy, when 
calmly seated at a winter's fireside, to charge Gregory 
VII with an undue assumption of temporal power. 
But he who will study the critical position of Europe 
daring the eleventh century must bow down in rever- 
ence before, the mighty mind of him who seized the 
moment to proclaim amid the storm the independence 
of the Christian Church. Was not his resistance to 
Henry expedient ? Yes ! And one too who knows that 
the Church was the lever by which the world was 
raised from barbarism to civilization, and will confess, 
with Guizot, that without a visible head Christianity 
would have perished in the shock that convulsed Europe 
to its centre." 

And again he tells us of one of those missioners, in 
the form of woman, who do battle and gain victories in 
life that are seldom recorded here : 

"The news of these victories imparted some consola- 
tion to the Lady Margaret's breast, now torn with 
anxiety and solicitude. Her grief was not lightened, 
because her own misfortunes were avenged in Henry's 
adversity, but because the chances of peace were in- 
creased by Eodolph's success. She was now incapable 
of relishing revenge. The feudal antipathies so long 
nourished, and so early instilled as to be almost a part 
of her existence, were entirely eradicated. From the 
evening of her interview with Father Omehr, before the 
now ruined Church of the Nativity, she had dedicated 
her life to the extinguishment of the feud between the 
houses of Hers 'and Stramen. For this she had prayed : 
for this she had toiled. But her labors were interrupted 



304 GEORGE H. MILES. 

by the harsh music of War, by gong and tymbalon. 
What could she do now ? Nothing. Nothing? When 
she knelt before the altar at Tubingen, before the sun 
had risen, and the Countess of Montfort felt as if she 
had given shelter to an angel, was she doing nothing ? 
When she lingered in the oratory of our Blessed Mother 
long after the sun had set, and the menials passed by 
on tiptoe least they should mar the celestial expression 
of her face, was she doing nothing ?" 

The strongest and most effective scene of the book is 
that in which the white-plumed knight, Rodolph, the 
king of the Franks, falls dead in the day of victory. It 
is a historical romance, and because of its simplicity 
and purity of thought and expression, is selected as a 
premium, year after year in Catholic schools, and be- 
stowed as a reward for moral or mental triumph at the 
commencement day. It is, therefore, regarded as a book 
for boys and girls, and yet the profoundest wisdom is 
not always hidden beneath high-sounding words, as 
some seem to think. Banquets are sometimes given 
where the eye is feasted while the palate is unsatisfied, 
and the guests depart more hungry than when they 
came. In the writings of George Miles, the goodness 
of Truth is always evident. That purity, that is the 
language of a pure nature, reveals itself in every line of 
his writing's, and in all his teachings there is wholesome 
food for heart and mind. 

His friends in early life were John E. Howard, Wil- 
liam Reed, Charles Bradenbaugh, long the President of 
the Mercantile Library, in Baltimore. Edwin Forrest 
continued his friendship and patronage to Mr. Miles 
through all his life. Joseph Jefferson, the comedian, 
to whom we owe so many happy moments, was also a 
if the Baltimore poet, and endeavored to encour- 
him in undertaking another play; finally, about 



GEORGE H. MTLES. 

1870, he gave to the public a paper on " Hamlet," which 
was first published in the Southern Review, and after- 
wards in pamphlet-form by Mr. John T. Ford. This 
analysis of Hamlet won for its author an extended no- 
tice, especially amongst the English critics. 

George Miles was a precocious child, speaking plainly 
at the age of two years, and reading at three. As a boy 
of thirteen and fifteen he wrote verses, and when gradu- 
ating at eighteen, was chosen to deliver the Valedictory 
Address. He was not studiously inclined, which caused 
much solicitude to his parents ; and Poetry, which is so 
ruefully regarded by many whose talents or genius take 
another way, was deemed by his friends the ignis fatuus 
that led to ruin. 

He was a true child of the South in his temperament 
and tastes, and his love of the " Lost Cause " is evinced 
in the many war-songs that came from his pen. Among 
the best known of his battle-songs is " God Save the 
South," which is inspiring in its tone, and musical in 
its wild ring, as he sang of "dear honor's sake:" 

Hear Honor's call, 
Summoning all, 
Summoning all of us 

Unto the strife. 
Sons of the South, awake! 
Strike till the brand shall break, 
Strike for dear Honor's sake, 

Freedom and life ! 

The bright little poem entitled " Coming at Last," 
refers to the first Confederate Cavalry raid into Mary- 
land, in the neighborhood of Emmittsburg. About 
1866 or '67, he wrote and published a book of Christmas 
Poems. He composed music for songs, hymns and lita- 
nies. He played quite well upon the piano and flute. 
As a tenor singer he ranked above the average. He was 



306 GEORGE H. MILES. 

a brilliant conversationalist, attracting by his blended 
charms all who came within the circle of his influence. 
In person he was robust, of medium height and athletic, 
noted as a walker and a gymnast. 

The depth of his heart was measured by the height 
of his intellect. No pensioner for money or service ever 
turned from him unaided. His hand was open always 
to his friends, and from the Poor he never turned with- 
out a blessing. 

In February, 1859, George Miles married Miss Ada- 
line Tiers, of New York, who still lives. No children 
blessed this union. The poet of Thornbrook died on 
the 23d of July, 1872, within one week of completing 
his forty-eighth year. He is buried in the churchyard 
of Saint Mary's College, where his memory is beloved. 

At the time of his death he was engaged in the writ- 
ing of a novel which would doubtless have gained for 
him a high place amongst the authors of his native 
country. The novel, however, lies yet unfinished as 
the author left it. Being a Koman Catholic, his writ- 
ings are best known amongst the people of that faith. 
He, however, was known and loved by those of all 
teachings — it could not have been otherwise — his intel- 
lect was broad, his deeds were good, his truth was per- 
fect. 




COMING AT LAST 



UP on the hill there, 
Who are they, pray ? 
Three dusty troopers 

Spurring this way? 
And that squadron behind them? 

Stand not aghast— 
Why! these are the Rebels, sir, 
Coming at last ! 

Coming so carelessly, 

Saunter id g on, 
Into the midst of us, 

Unto our town: 
Thrice thirty miles to-day 

These meu have passed, 
Steuart at the head of theoi 

Coming: at last! 



Oh, sir! no gold lace 

Burns in the sun, 
But each blooded war-horse 

And rider seem one, 
These men could ride at need, 

Out- ride the blast — 
O! yes, sir, the Rebels 

Are coming at last! 



;08 COMING AT LAST. 

Circling Mac's army, 

Three days at work ! 
"Under that smile of theirs 

Famine may lurk. 
Out with the best you have, 

Fill the bowl fast, 
For Jeff's ragged Rebels 

Are coming at last! 

Geoege H. Miles, Frederick County, Md. 




GENERAL AKNOLD ELZEY, 



"Circumstances draw forth men."— Thiers. 



m 



R. ARNOLD ELZEY JONES fixed his home, 
which he named Elmwood, on the Manokin 
river, in Somerset county, Maryland. His 
wife had in her maidenhood borne the name 
of Annie Wilson Jackson. She was the mother of 
Arnold Elzey Jones, who afterwards became a valiant 
soldier in the Confederate Army. 

The name of Elzey is found amongst the early records 
of Maryland's history. In McMahon's history John 
Elzey is told of as having received a commission from 
Governor Philip Calvert, in 1661, to form a settlement 
on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, upon the Mano- 
kin river. A treaty of amity was afterwards entered 
into by the settlers with the Indian Emperor of Nan- 
ticoke. 

Arnold Elzey was born on the 18th of December, 
1816, at Elmwood. At the age of sixteen he entered 
the United States Military Academy at West Point ; and 
as the future sketched itself before his boyish footsteps, 
it is not likely that he dreamed one dream of the terri- 
ble combination of rights and wrongs that would some 
day place his name before the world, and make it hon- 
ored by all true-hearted Marylanders. 
26 



310 GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 

God is the great Judge. Justice weighs impartially 
Truth and Eight. To those who triumph in the right 
the victory is sufficient. To the conquered is the suf- 
fering ! Forgiveness belongs to all. 

At the age of twenty Arnold Elzey Jones graduated, 
according to the family record ; yet, by the United States 
Military Register, one year more is added to his life at 
the closing of his " school term." 

In the year 1845 the young soldier, then a first lieu- 
tenant in the Second Artillery, married Miss Ellen Irwin, 
the daughter of Henry Irwin, of Huntington county, 
Pennsylvania. 

Several years later, at the age of twenty-eight, by per- 
mission of the Legislature of Maryland, he adopted, as 
a sir-name, Elzey, and abandoned that of Jones. In 
this he complied with an often expressed desire of his 
father that he should adopt the family name of Elzey, 
which had become extinct on the marriage of his pater- 
nal grandmother. 

Setting aside the question of literary talent or capa- 
bility, an undeniable fact presents itself: only a soldier 
may portray the life of a soldier beyond the fireside. 

In a pleasant volume, entitled " The Maryland Line," 
Major W. W. Goldsborough, of Baltimore, takes us into 
the stirring camp-life of the Confederate soldier. From. 
afar we behold the advance and the retreat, now the Grey 
is the victor and now the Blue. Long lines of bayonets 
glitter in the sunlight of a perfect summer's day, and 
then " the men at arms " wheel with the precision of 
evenly measured music. Across the verdant field a 
courier dashes on a strong-limbed steed, bearing, better 
worth the guarding than the heart of his life, a message 
for his general ! 

The battles wherein glory is sought and won are pic- 
tured, with their even columns of staunch soldiers, the 






GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 311 

deadly weapons, and the flying colors ; then defeat, and 
death, and the grave. 

Major Goldsborongh tells us, in his book, of Elzey; 
the words are strong and good, born of that pride that 
all brave soldiers feel in the brave acts of another, 
whose 

"Deeds are better things than words are." 

The following is taken from the "Biographical 
Eegister " of the United States Military Academy of 
West Point: 

ARNOLD ELZEY, 

Cadet at the United States Military Academy from July 1, 
1833, to July 1, 1837, when he was graduated and promoted in 
the Army to 

(Second Lieutenant, 2d Artillery, July 1, 1837.) 

Served in the Florida War, 1837-38 ; in the Cherokee Nation, 
1838, while emigrating the Indians to the West; on the North- 
ern Frontier during the Canada Border disturbances, at Detroit, 
Mich., 1838-39 ; Mackinac, Mich., 1839. 

(First Lieutenant, 2d Artillery, Nov. 12, 1839.) 

Buffalo, N. Y., 1839-40; Recruiting, 1840; Buffalo, N. Y., 
1840; Rochester, N. Y., 1840-41, and Buffalo, N. Y , 1841; in 
garrison at Fort Adams, R. I., 1841-43; Fort Lafayette, N. Y., 
1843, 1844-45, and Fort Columbus, N. Y., 1845; in Military Oc- 
cupation of Texas, 1845-46 ; in the War with Mexico, 1846-48, 
being engaged in the defence of Fort Brown, May 3-9, 1846 ; 
siege of Vera Cruz, March 9-29, 1847; battle of Cerro Gordo, 
April 17-18, 1847; skirmish of Amazoque, May 14, 1847; cap- 
ture of San Antonio, August 20, 1847; Battle of Cburubisco, 
August 20, 1847 ; battle of Molino del Rey, Sept. 8, 1847. 

(Brevet Captain, August 20, 1847, for gallant and meritorious 
conduct in the battles of Contreras and Churubisco, Mexico.) 

Storming of Chapultepec, Sept. 13, 1847 ; assault and the cap- 
ture of the City of Mexico, Sept. 13-14, 1847, and as Adjutant 
2d Artillery, Dec, 1847, to Jan., 1848 ; on Recruiting service, 



312 GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 

1848; in garrison at Fort Monroe, Va., 1848-49, and Fort John- 
ston, N. C, 1849; in Florida hostilities against the Seminole 

(Captain, 2d Artillery, Feb. 14, 1849.) 

Indians, 1849-50 ; in garrison at Fort Moultrie, S. C, 1851-53; 
in Florida hostilities, 1853-55 ; 1855-56, being engaged against 

(Resigned Brevet Commission, April 2, 1857.) 

the Seminole Indians in the skirmish near Choalisca Key, March 
29,1856; in garrison at Fort Ontario, N. Y., 1856-57; on fron- 
tier duty at Fort Mackinac, Mich., 1857, and Fort Leavenworth, 
Kan., 1857-60; on leave of absence, 1860, and in garrison at 
Augusta Arsenal, Ga., 1860-61 ; Fort Monroe, Va., 1861. 

(Resigned, April 25, 1861.) 

Joined in the Rebellion of 1861 against the United States. 

In the West Point Register the name of Elzey is en- 
tered as Arnold Jones, his family name. 

At the breaking out of the war, he resigned his posi- 
tion in the United States Army. Upon the establish- 
ment of the Confederate Army, he received the commis- 
sion of Captain in the Artillery, which was the rank 
he held in the service of the United States. 

The First Maryland Regiment was organized in June, 
1861. On the 16th day of that month, commissions 
were issued to Elzey as Colonel, to George H. Steuart, 
late Captain of Cavalry, U. S. A., as Lieutenant-Colonel, 
and to Bradley T. Johnson as Major. 

Colonel Elzey joined his Regiment at Winchester, 
about June 20th. He was immediately assigned to 
a Brigade, consisting of the First Maryland, under 
Lieutenant-Colonel Steuart; 13th Infantry, Colonel 
A. P. Hill, (afterwards Brevet- General Hill) ; 10th Vir- 
ginia, Colonel Gibbons, and the 3d Tennessee, Colonel 
Yaughan. 

They remained about Winchester for a month. On 
July 4th, they marched to Martinsburg, Virginia, to 
offer battle to Patterson. 






GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 313 

On this march, Major Goldsborough says: "To the 
First Maryland was assigned the post of honor, the ex- 
treme right ; and had there been occasion, most stub- 
bornly would they have contested every inch of the 
ground they occupied." 

On the 18th of July, the march was begun for the 
famous battle-ground of Manassas. Colonel Elzey was 
anxious for promotion, and is said to have felt slighted 
because Bee and Kirby Smith had each been made a 
Brigadier, while he had the command without the rank. 
So great is the thirst, even among the great, for the 
empty honor of a name ! And so he fought for it, and 
won. 

In an address to his men, Elzey said : " ! In the 

hour of battle you will remember that you are Mary- 
landers. Every eye from across the waters of the Po- 
tomac which separates you from your homes, is upon 
you, and all those who are dear to us are watching with 
anxious, beating hearts, the fleshing of your maiden 
swords. And they shall not be disappointed, for he had 
better never been born who proves himself a craven 
when we grapple with the foeman." 

Elzey's Brigade arrived at Manassas about mid-day on 
the 21st of July, 1861— that day so fraught with joy 
and sadness, gloom and glory, for the victor and the 
vanquished accordingly ! 

Owing to the indifferent marching of some of the 
raw troops, much delay was caused; General "Joe" E. 
Johnston therefore halted at Paiis, in Virginia, from 
whence, he forwarded the troops by rail to the field of 
action. General Elzey and his officers were mounted, 
having taken their horses with them. The field officers 
of the Brigade were, however, afoot. 

As the troops alighted from the cars, Kirby Smith 
galloped up and ordered the command forward at a 
20* 



314 GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 

double-quick. General Smith was in command of the 
division formed by his own and Elzey's Brigade, but his 
own Brigade not having come up, he had really only 
Elzey's under his command. The 13th Virginia and 
three Maryland regiments were sent off on a double- 
quick to the battle-field, the column headed by Smith 
and Elzey on horseback. With this unaccustomed speed 
and fatigue, many of the men were completely overcome. 
While the shells rushed with a whiz and whirr through 
the air, Bradley Johnson staggered up to Elzey and said ; 
" Colonel, I've broke down, and if you don't furnish me 
with a horse, I can go no further." The consolatory 
reply was : " I can't help you." At that moment a sharp 
fire broke out from a wood near by on the right. As 
the fire rained upon them, General Smith fell over the 
neck of his horse. (When General Kirby Smith was 
wounded, the command devolved upon Elzey). " There," 
said Elzey turning to Bradley Johnson, "God is just! 
Smith's, down ; get his horse !" The horse, not appre- 
ciating the good and handsome things of this world, 
with a wild plunge eluded the outstretched hands and 
disappeared across the field. Yet out of the midst of 
the fiery woods a magnificent steed came dashing; it 
was riderless, and no doubt ownerless. Major Johnson 
caught the bridle and jumped into the saddle. Elzey 
smiled at this, and turning to his young comrade ex- 
claimed, " Now for a yellow sash, or six feet of ground !" 

Getting his troops into position, he charged the enemy 
dashingly! daringly! gloriously! The line of foemen 
broke and fled in confusion, and Manassas was won. As 
Elzey and his men pushed on to the Henry House, that 
courtly soldier, Beauregard, rode up and in his marked 
French manner exclaimed : " Hail, Elzey, thou Blucher 
of the day !" 

It is said that at the same time President Davis told 
him he should have his stripe so nobly earned. 



GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 315 

Arnold Elzey's commission, as Brigadier, dated from 
July 21st, 1861. 

In the Valley Campaign of 1SG2 the Maryland regi- 
ments received another commander, and Elzey was given 
a Virginia Brigade.. 

Upon this change the officers and soldiers of the 
Maryland Line, drawn up before headquarters, took a 
formal yet affecting leave of their beloved commander. 
Elzey always regarded, with love and pride, the Mary- 
land regiments* under his command, nor did his interest 
Hag when he ceased to be their leader. In the fight at 
Front Royal, on the 21th day of May, 1862, the First 
Maryland regiment, 0. S. A., was pitted, by a singular 
fate of war, against the First Maryland, U. S. A. The 
Confederate regiment was victorious and the cavalry 
took the Federal regiment prisoners. Elzey rode gaily 
over to the victors and tendered his congratulations to 
Ms regiment as he called that gallant body. 

At the battle of Cross Keys, on June 8th, 1862, he 
chose a position, put his troops in place, and asked the 
approbation of Ewell, his commanding officer ; he showed 
him the order in which they were disposed. General 
Ewell, pleased with the disposition, adopted the same 
arrangement, and the battle of Cross Keys was fought 
according to the plan of Elzey. 

When that Campaign was over, battle after battle was 
fought around Richmond, and Elzey was in the thick 
of the tight. He carried his brave command over a 
broad stretch of broken ground, unfalteringly, through 
the hottest fire. Nearly all of the staff officers were 
either killed or wounded, and General Elzey was shot 
through the head and mouth. After this he was pro- 
moted, though his wounds rendered him inactive for 
awhile. In 1863, he was put in command of the de- 
fences of Richmond. " In Early's Maryland Campaign,'' 



316 GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 

says a fellow-soldier, " he was sent along to command 
some mythical Maryland divisions which were never 
found." 

The words of Colonel J. R. Herbert, of Baltimore, 
are but the repetition of sentiments expressed by all 
who knew him: " General Arnold Elzey was a gallant 
soldier and loved by all who served under Mm." 

It seems somehow as if the lines of the brave old 
Scotch poet applied to him, when he tells of a soldier 
who 

" The sword could sway, 
And lightly bear the ring away ; 
Nor less with courteous precepts stored, 
Could dance in hall and carve at board." 

Writing of General Elzey, General Beauregard, in a 
letter to the author of these sketches, says: "He was 
brave, zealous and intelligent; three qualities which are 
indispensable to a commanding officer." 

And this tribute to a soldier of the "Lost Cause," 
from his friend and comrade, General Bradley T. John- 
son, is strong and wonderfully generous for the day in 
which we live : 

"He was the soul of chivalry. He had served in 
Florida and Mexico, and used to tell us of the way gen- 
tlemen ought to go to war, not in our rough, uncouth 
way, no supplies, no stores, no anything. His head- 
quarters was the centre of Maryland hopes and aspira- 
tions. All of us Volunteers of Maryland had gone into 
service for the purpose of enfranchising our native 
State, and giving her the chance to join the South, when 
we believed her will, her interest and her honor required 
her to go. 

" During the long marches — in the bivouac, in the 
lull of battle — the sole topic was, ' What will they think 
of us at home?' 'Will they know how well we are 



GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 317 

doing?' (for Maryland vanity always gave itself full 
credit for what it was performing). We would describe 
imaginary scenes — our march down Charles street — our 
being welcomed at the Monument by the civic authori- 
ties ; the ribbons that we would wear, the smiles that 
would be lavished on us. The very mementoes that 
would bear our names to the Future, all the charms of 
enthusiastic gallant Youth, stirred by the highest senti- 
ments of patriotism and honor, were the themes dis- 
cussed, the dreams we dreamed night and day. I have 
heard Elzey discant on our future glories — for we all 
believed our time would come, and we claimed to inherit 
the natures of The Old Line whose descendants and 
heirs we are. We certainly tried to emulate them. 
Elzey was the centre and the soul of all our day-dreams ; 
the embodiment of that sentiment burning in each 
Maryland man, which would have sent them gaily to 
death to serve and save our beloved Maryland ! Elzey's 
heart was gentle and kind, his manner sharp and mili- 
tary — his roughness of speech was a mere jfaom de par- 
ler — as in the case of Kirby Smith, whom he loved and 
sympathized with. 

" He was a superb soldier ! Bather impatient at the 
slovenly soldiering of volunteers, but thoroughly ap- 
preciating their pluck and dash. His military eye for 
position was the best in Jackson's corps. His choice of 
the field at Cross-Keys was confirmed at once by Ewell, 
and complimented in his report and that of General 
Jackson." 

To quote from Major Goldsborough's "Maryland 
Line," can scarcely be inappropriate in this place, and 
this is what he says of our brave Maryland boys : 

" these brave men never complained of what 

was imposed upon them. Throughout that dreary fall, 
and the long cold winter, nearly naked and half fed, 



318 GENERAL ARNOLD ELZEY. 

they silently did their duty, whilst thousands were 
proving recreant to the Cause. Elegant and refined 
gentlemen, who at home never knew what it was to 
want for a single comfort, were in rags and tatters, 
sleeping in mud and filth, and when the bleak winds 
of December pierced many a rent in their wretched 
garments, they only drew their sorry blankets the 
closer around their gaunt and shivering limbs, and 
cheerfully responded to the call for any duty. Was it 
a wonder, then, that after the battle of Cold Harbor 
General Breckenriclge should have exclaimed, ' What 
could not be done with a hundred thousand such 
men !' " 

We are proud of the grand Old Line, 
That back through a hundred years 

Strove with the foe from Britain's Isle, 
With its life, and blood, and tears ! 

We are proud of the brave Young Line, 

That gave to a stainless name, 
The noble deeds of a daring cause 

To g'ow in the lists of Fame! 

March on in the path of the Old ! 

March out to the unborn years! 
We pledge your troth in a Nation's need 

With a woman's faith and tears! 

General Arnold Elzey died on the 22d of February, 
in the year 1871. His only son bears the name of 
Arnold J. Elzey. 

General Elzey is buried at Greenmount Cemetery, 
near Baltimore city. 



ADDRESS OF CAPTAIN GEORGE THOMAS, 
At Loudoun Park, October 22, 1874. 




E are here to-day, Friends and Comrades, to 
render just and fitting tribute to the memory 
of those of our immediate companionship who 
gave up their lives in the great struggle be- 
tween the Sections. A glad and willing sacrifice in de- 
fense of principles that they as well as we had ever been 
taught were the distinctive political axioms of the South. 
We do not come in this hallowed presence to proclaim 
the truth of those principles, still less to assert or even 
to acknoweldge that the dread uncertainty of War had 
rendered a verdict that proclaims them false. This we 
willingly remit to the political agitator of the day, to the 
arbitrament of Time and the calmer judgment of his- 
toric days to render final decision on. Setting all this 
aside in memory of dear companions gone to their ac- 
count, in recollection of their kindly deeds and knightly 
courage, of joys and dangers together shared and tasted, 
we come to celebrate the placing of this Memorial -Stone 
that will tell to every passer by that they whose names 
are there inscribed possessed a record that their surviv- 
ing comrades were not unwilling should be read in the 
full light of after times. The voice of passion is not yet 
stilled, the turbulence of the life and death struggle 



320 ADDRESS OF CAPTAIN THOMAS. 

not yet quieted, yet so far stilled, so far quieted that we 
may, without all fear of misrepresentation, join heartily 
in this work of love and duty. 

And there are reasons why this memorial tribute is 
peculiarly appropriate at our hands. There is often an 
individuality observable about associations of men that 
makes them to take hold of the hearts of their mem- 
bers with tenacious grasp, and to form as it were a part 
of their existence forever after ; and this was especially 
the case with the company organizations successively 
commanded by Oapt. Wm. H. Murray. Composed of 
homogeneous elements, the individual members having 
such entirely similar associations, and it is to look back 
to and recall, there could not have been other than 
a feeling of perfect community pervading us as a whole; 
but above all, and beyond all this there existed the 
further bond of that untiring influence that it is the 
especial privilege of some men to exert, and which was 
to a peculiar extent exerted by our Commander, im- 
pressed as his commands were with his personal traits 
and characteristics, so that the designation " Murray's 
Company" became as familiar to the military ear as 
though he had been operating with an independent 
command. And so we come now, as the survivors of 
Murray's Companies, to render honor to his memory as 
well to that of those of his commands who gave, as he 
did, their young lives to the Cause ; not then simply as 
Confederates, not as friends merely do we pause for a 
little while, in the bustle of Life, to come in a body to 
unite in the ceremonies of to-day. 

We come rather as bound by ties that make the 
memories we celebrate a very part of our ownselves. 
Engrossed as we may be in the duties of Life, separated 
and engaged in occupations that keep us, for the most 
part, wide asunder, there is this at least in our Past 






ADDRESS OP CAPTAIN THOMAS. 321 

that makes us feel as one. There is that in onr com- 
mon history that will urge us, with no common im- 
pulse, to come here as to the Mecca of the heart, 
bringing with us, perchance, the hopes of the generation 
yet to play its part on the World's great stage, to recall 
for our comfort and for their instruction the deeds and 
characteristics of those whose names are here enrolled 
on History's most honored page. And why these? 
Near by are the remains of many who fell in the same 
struggle, and on the same side, and never while life lasts 
will you be able to look upon these mounds and these 
monuments as upon any others ; yet, I challenge your 
own hearts to answer if there be not still a different 
feeling in thinking of the times that are no more, in 
connection with the memories of your Comrades of 
Companies "H"and"A." 

Well might you essay the lesson of self-sacrifice and 
noble endurance — pure, prompting, unyielding deter- 
mination — in recalling and recording the names and 
lives of the Lees, the Jacksons, and the Steuarts ; the 
Pegrams, the Ashbys, and the Winders, who, now but 
dust and ashes, have left name and fame that the pen 
of their most malignant enemy would utterly fail to 
taint or tarnish ; well might your hearts swell with 
honest pride in telling of the wondrous deeds of daring 
done on our well-loved Southern soil, when might and 
numbers, struggling with the right, so often reeled and 
in utter rout recoiled before the skill and gallantry of 
their painfully outnumbered foe; yet with what differ- 
ent, with what tenderer feelings you would recall the 
day of Gettysburg, and tell how the bristling summit 
almost gained, your own commander Murray died, how 
when the assembly was made at the foot of the hill, 
your shattered remnant looked around aghast to see 
the gaps that sudden death had made; how Morrison, 



322 ADDRESS OF CAPTAIN THOMAS. 

that sturdy soldier, came safely down the hill of death 
only to meet his summons at the base ; of Ives, so 
gallant and so courteous ; of Iglehart, so true and earn- 
est and brave, and bright-faced Charley Lloyd, can you 
not see him now, with blanched cheek and bowed form, 
staggering from the ranks, and yet running back in a 
little while to his post in the line only to meet the too 
sure summons of a bullet in the brain ; and Blackiston, 
with all his soldierly instincts keenly alive, anxious 
only that none should be before him in the charge. 
Such the names — such to us the memories of Gettys- 
burg! The march after Meade, the winter in Hanover, 
Cold Harbor, White Oak Swamp, the trenches around 
Petersburg, how with such mention crowd to our 
thoughts the names of Hollyday, Grill, Braddock, Kip 
Deal, Denton, Prentiss, and* the host of others who 
bore with us the trials of those days. Wagner, already 
devoted, when ordered on the fatal skirmish line; and 
Laird so gallant and true, always earnest, always with 
words of cheer, and always at his post, like the brave 
sharpshooter, Prentiss, breasting the storm of battle as 
with charmed life, to meet his summons when the 
struggle was well nigh hopeless. 

And you, comrades of company " H," is there need 
that I should recall the special incidents of your career, 
the scenes with which you were most familiar during 
the first year of the trial, the names of those who with 
you enlisted in the days when all was hopeful for the 
cause, but who have now their names enrolled among 
the dead upon the field of Glory ? Is there need that 
these things should be pictured in any poor words of 
mine, or that the two companies setting aside mere 
company designations and special recollections should 
be proclaimed as one, to make you keenly conscious of 
a sympathetic blending of associations that make of us 



ADDRESS OF CAPTAIN THOMAS. 323 

all, in everything that the term implies, peculiarly 
comrades. Separated though you were by the fortunes 
of War, your fates connecting you with different com- 
mands, is it possible for you to remember with any 
ordinary feeling, your old, your first command ? Can 
you think of your assemblage at Richmond, remember- 
ing who your comrades were and their after fates, with- 
out acknowledging it all as a part of your inner lives 
from which you could not, even if you would, escape. 
A part most dear and most precious! How intimately 
must be associated with your most cherished recollec- 
tions the figure of the gallant McKim, leading even 
Stonewall's own brigade in the charge, to him the 
charge, that led to death and imperishable glory ! Col- 
ston and Lloyd West, do you not remember them well ? 
Struggling both with the Angel of Death, one with 
breathless steps reaching the Heights of Bolivar only 
to meet a little speedier summons; one, stretched upon 
a bed of pain, begging for permission to go with his 
Command, on what was supposed, an expedition to meet 
superior numbers at the time of the Pohic march, 
destined, alas! to enter upon a longer, far more distant 
journey ere the days of that Autumn month were over. 
Mackall, Russell, Costigan, Steel, Hammett, Redman, 
Price, and all the glorious company of those who with 
them fell. ! how steadily by our sides then stalked 
the greedy Reaper — Death ! How steadily marched our 
comrades to their fate ! Forever let their names, and 
deeds, and principles, be blended in our thoughts. 

And here let us ask what was the particular charac- 
teristic uniting these men, who, in whatever held, 
under whatever leader, carried with them the soldierly 
pride and resolve, sprung from their commander's 
nerve and iron will, that made them seem ever ani- 
mated by like promptings. Know what was Murray's 



324 ADDRESS OF CAPTAIN THOMAS. 

special trait as a soldier, and the question readily is 
answered — stern, unyielding, unshrinking sense of duty, 
no thought, no impulse, no prompting, but the strictest 
sense of duty. His whole life as a soldier was but ap- 
propriately rounded by his death in the face of the 
thousands fronting the little band of whom he was one. 
For him, standing there erect, with all his bravery on, 
his men lying dead and wounded all around him, two- 
thirds of his command already yielded to the bloody 
needs of War, the line forced back, the summit not yet 
won, his instinct as a soldier telling him the day was 
lost, and with it the cause for which his sword had 
been drawn — for him, such as he was and so situated, 
there was but one course possible — no step in retreat, 
no yielding — only to stand, though all alone fronting 
the foe, till the fatal blow should come — and so he fell. 
"With him, as with those who truly followed him, there 
was but one possible appreciation of duty to the cause 
— Death rather than Defeat. Nor was this sublimity of 
devotion in him the result of desire for military glory; 
it was not born of sudden impulse, nor was it the 
creature, in any degree, of passion for renown. Those 
who knew him best recognize it as the necessary result 
of his fixed determination, in such a cause, never to sub- 
mit or yield. In his death he was but acting out the 
solemn convictions of duty that went to form a part of 
his matured resolves. You have all beared the story 
that is told of the Spartan mother, in the time so far 
iu the past, who, when called upon by her own son for 
a blessing as he was about to march to meet the foe 
gave him no wish for individual renown, no wish for 
safety, none for speedy return, but with her whole 
nature alive to a just appreciation of duty to the cause, 
when one's country calls, she bade him return either 
with his shield or upon it. 






• ADDRESS OF CAPTAIN THOMAS. 325 

Since the day when first this story was told in An- 
cient Greece till now, the spirit that dictated the reply 
has been lauded ever as the noblest evidence of true 
appreciation of duty to a country's needs. Millions 
have heard and have taken the lesson to heart. The 
halo of historic myth is around and about it, and it 
seems to admiring generations as only an idealized rep- 
resentation of what might be in a true patriot's heart. 
And yet the same beautiful tribute was paid, the self- 
same unselfish appreciation of duty was exhibited in a 
quiet home on West river, in Maryland, when Captain 
Wm. H. Murray went to announce to his mother that 
the time had come for him, with others of his kind and 
kin, to put in act and deed his expression of disavowal 
of the acts that sought to set aside the cardinal political 
doctrines that he had ever been taught were the safe- 
guard and salvation of his Country. He asked his 
mother's blessing, but with it asked for no expression 
of desire that military glory and renown might come to 
him, none that he might safely return to his well- 
beloved home, none that he might see her face once 
more — only the Spartan mother's blessing. This was 
all he asked. It was from no boyish impulse, from no 
ambitious longings, from no passion for the pomp and 
panoply of War that he was ready and willing to enter 
upon the uncertain struggle. He saw and knew the 
right, and with his life was earnestly determined to 
maintain it, "with my shield, Mother, or upon it," and 
so the blessing was asked, and so was given. And on 
his shield, all glorious and stainless, he was borne to the 
home of his fathers. 

.Living, he was an example bright to follow ! Dead, 
he is a splended memory that we most gladly and 
proudly honor. 



27* 



A PRAYER FOR PEACE. 



>EACE! Peace! God of our fathers, grant us Peace 1 

Unto our cry of anguish and despair 
Give ear and pity ! From the lonely homes, 
Where widowed beggary and orphaned woe 
Fill their poor urns with tears; from trampled plains, 
Where the bright harvest Thou hast sent us, rots — 
The blood of them who should have garnered it 
Calling to Thee— from fields of carnage, where 
The foul-beaked vultures, sated, flap their wiugs 
O'er crowded corpses, that but yesterday 
Bore hearts of brothers, beating high with love 
And common hopes and pride, all blasted now ;— 
Father of Mercies! not alone from these 
Our prayer and wail are lifted. Not alone 
Upon the battle's seared and desolate track, 
Nor with the sword and flame, is it, O God, 
That Thou hast smitten us. Around our hearths, 
And in the crowded streets and busy marts, 
Where echo whispers not the far-off strife 
That slays our loved ones;— in the solemn halls 
Of safe and quiet counsel— nay, beneath 
The temple-roofs that we have reared to Thee, 
And mid their rising incense, — God of Peace! 
The curse of war is on us. Greed and hate 



A PRAYER FOR PEACE. 327 

Hungering for gold and blood: Ambition, bred 

Of passionate vanity and sordid lusts, 

Mad with the base desire of tyrannous sway 

Over men's souls and thoughts; have set their price 

On human hecatombs, and sell and buy 

Their sons and brothers for the shambles. Priests, 

With white, anointed, supplicating hands, 

From Sabbath unto Sabbath clasped to Thee, 

Burn, in their tingling pulses, to fling down 

Thy censers and Thy cross, to clutch the throats 

Of kinsmen by whose cradles they were born, 

Or grasp the brand of Herod, and go forth 

Till Rachel hath no children left to slay. 

The very name of Jesus, writ upon 

Thy shrines, beneath the spotless, outstretched wings 

Of Thine Almighty Dove, is wrapt and hid 

With bloody battle-flags, and from the spires 

That rise -above them, angry banners fiout 

The skies to which they point, amid the clang 

Of rolling war songs tuned to mock Thy praise, 

All things once prized and honored are forgot. 
The Freedom that we worshipped, next to Thee; 
The manhood that was Freedom's spear and shield: 
The proud, true heart; the brave, outspoken word. 
Which might be stifled, but could never wear 
The guise, whate'er the profit, of a lie; — 
All these are gone, and iu their stead, have come 
The vices of the miser and the slave,— 
Scorning no shame that bringeth gold or power, 
Knowing no love, or faith, or reverence, 
Or sympathy, or tie, or aim, or hope, 
Save as begun in self, and ending there, 
• like i. i these, O blessed God' 



o28 A PRAYER FOR PEACE. 

Scourge us no longer ! Send us down, once more, 
Some shining seraph in Thy glory clad, 
To wake the midnight of our sorrowing 
With tidings of Good Will and Peace to men ; 
And if the star that through the darkness led 
Earth's wisdom then, guide not our folly now, 
Oh, be the lightning Thine Evangelist, 
With all its fiery, forked tongues, to speak 
The unanswerable message of Thy will. 

Peace I Peace ! God of our fathers, grant us Peace 
Peace in our hearts and at Thine altars; Peace 
On the red waters and their blighted shores ; 
Peace for the leaguered cities, and the hosts 
That watch and bleed, around them and within ; 
Peace for the homeless and the fatherless; 
Peace for the captive on his weary way. 
And the mad crowds who jeer his helplessness. 
For them that suffer, them that do the wrong — 
Sinning and sinned against — O God I for all — 
For a distracted, torn, and bleeding land — 
Speed the glad tidings I Give us, give us Peace I 

S. Teackle Wallis. 1863. 



-^H-Z3*Kr 




WILLIAM HENRY KINEHART. 

SCULPTOR. 




" Thus was Beauty sent from heaven, 
The lovely ministress of truth and good 
In this fair world.'" 

this "lovely ministress," the teacher and in- 
spire!* of Kinehart, our thanks are due; he 
was her worker and the realizer of that ideal, 
only infused into the soul by beauty, truth 
and goodness. 

William H. Kinehart was born in the year 1826. 
His father was a farmer of German descent, honest and 
thrifty. The boy gained the foundation of an English 
education at a rustic school in Westminster, Frederick', 
now Carroll county, Maryland, and when not em- 
ployed in study he occupied his time in active duties 
about his father's farm. Upon this place was a marble 
quarry and stone-cutting yard, in which the sculptor 
of the Future evinced deep interest. Thus Experience, 
often the severest, though the faithfulest teacher, be- 
stowed upon him early in life his first strong lesson. 
The dullness of routine belonging to such an existence 
did not satisfy the young Kinehart. At the age of six- 
teen he obtained the consent of his father to seek an 
apprenticeship in the city of Baltimore. Through the 
aid of Andrew Gregg, Esq., a respectable merchant, lie 



330 WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART, 

'was admitted to a position in the marble yards of 
Baughman & Bevan, on North Howard sheet. When 
not employed in arduous manual labor he cculd he 
found in the Library or School of Design, at the Mary- 
land Institute. Mythology, Ancient History, Anat- 
omy, Architecture, Boohs of Art and Artists were his 
teachers, his study and his themes. These treasures of 
mind-knowledge he gathered and scattered, or else 
stored for future use. His skill as a workman was so 
great before he reached his majority, that we are told 
the workmanship of the finest quality came from his, 
hands. The best marble mantles were intrusted io 
him, and at this time, says a contributor to the " Balti- 
more Sun," "the stone-cutting trade had not reached 
the perfection of the present day in Baltimore. There 
were no steam saws and rubbers, and there was not the 
same improvement in, or in fact, demand for elaborately 
carved monuments and ornamented tablets." Delicacy 
of design and artistic taste were revealed in a marked 
manner in the work of this humble carver, whose name 
was already glowing on the unread scroll for coming 
days. His first lessons in practical mechanical drawing 
were received from Frederick List, a fellow-workman. 
Einehart was made foreman of Baughman s establish- 
ment when only twenty-three years of age; and while 
still holding this position he gained some praise for 
several casts and finished statues which were the works 
of his own hands. Einehart desired in some way to make 
real the beautiful image, that Genius, inspired by Love 
and touched by Fancy, had already presented to Ins 
poet-vision. His desire was fulfilled through the earn- 
est and substantial aid of Mr. W. T. Walters, whose 
friendship, proved in more than empty words, the 
Sculptor never forgot. He returned this strong help 
with confidence and high respect, fully appreciated by 
his benefactor. 



WILLIAM HENRY RINBHART. 331 

The first visit of Rinehart to Europe was in 1855. 
At Florence, in Italy, he worked with other young 
artists for ordinary wages. Into his work he let his 
heart escape, and imprisoned there it shone in each 
curve and line of the polished marble. 
11 O, Life, O, Poetry, 
which means life in life!" 

In the year 1857 he returned to Baltimore, bringing 
with him two pieces in basso relievo. They represented 
Night and Morning. They were purchased by Mr. 
Augustus J. Albert, and are still in the possession of 
that gentleman. Rinehart had for a while a studio at 
Carroll Hall, in Baltimore city. In 1858, however, he 
returned to Europe. He fixed his residence in the 
Eternal City, which he regarded as his home, though 
he paid frequent visits to the northern portion of 
Europe. The inspiring atmosphere of Kome seemed to 
awaken his marvelous energies into new life and free- 
dom. In 1866 and 1872 he visited Baltimore. On the 
10th of December, 1872, a heroic statue in bronze was 
unveiled to the public in front of the State House 
at Annapolis. The creator of the statue was William 
H. Rinehart. The figure represents Chief Justice 
Roger Brooke Taney. The orators upon this occasion 
were Governor Pinkney Whyte, of Maryland, and Mr. 
Severn Teackle Wallis, the poet-lawyer of Baltimore: 

Address of Mr. S. Teackle Wallis. 
The ceremonies attendant upon the unveiling of the 
Statue erected by the State of Maryland, in honor of the 
late Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney, took place in 
the Senate Chamber, at Annapolis, at noon of December 
10t.h, 1872. The Report and Address of the Committee 
were read by the chairman, Mr. S. T. Wallis, who in 
their name made formal delivery of the Monument to 



332 WILLIAM HENRY RLNEHART. 

the Governor of the State. His Excellency, Governor 

Whyte, responded briefly, and when he had concluded, 

company proceeded to the grounds in front of the 

te House, where, upon the order of the Governor, 

the statue was uncovered. 

During the ceremony in the Chamber, the Governor 
occupied the place of the President of the Senate, the 
Judges of the Court of Appeals, with other prominent 
representatives of the Bench and Bar of the State, being 
upon one side, and the Officers of the Naval Academy, 
in full uniform, with Eear Admiral Worden at their 
head, being seated on the other. His Excellency re- 
mained standing during the delivery of Mr. Wallis' 
address. 
Your Excellency : 

By an Act of the General Assembly of Maryland, 
passed at the Session of 1867, the sum of five thousand 
dollars was appropriated for "the building or erecting 
a suitable monument over the remains of the late Chief 
Justice Eoger B. Taney, on some suitable site in the 
Slate House yard, or in the State House itself," and 
Messrs. G. Frederick Maddox, of St. Mary's county, 
Charles E. Trail and Hugh McAleer, of Frederick 
county, James T. Earle, of Queen Anne's county, Henry 
Williams, of Calvert county, and George M. Gill and 
S. T. Wallis, of Baltimore city, were appointed a com- 
mittee to carry into effect the provisions of the statute. 
Upon the organization of the committee, it was found 
to be their unanimous desire that the execution of the 
; osed work should be entrusted to the distinguished 
Iptor, Mr. William H. Kinchart, a native and citizen 
' ' aryland, for many years a resident of Home. The 
>nnt appropriated being wholly insufficient, not only 
to compensate the labors of so eminent an artist, but even 
to meet the necessary cost of a monument at all worthy 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 333 

of the State and the occasion, the committee entertained 
serious doubts of their ability to discharge their duties 
satisfactorily, without further legislative provision. 
From this embarrassment they were happily relieved by 
the liberality and public spirit of the artist himself, 
who responded to their invitation by a prompt and un- 
conditional acceptance of the commission. It is grati- 
fying to the committee to make official acknowledgment 
of their obligations to Mr. Rinehart, for the cheerful 
readiness with which he not only undertook the work, 
but volunteered to be content with the honor of the 
commission as it stood, and the pride and pleasure of 
uniting with his fellow-citizens in their tribute to the 
illustrious dead. The committee, of course, did not 
'feel that it became them so far to tax the generosity of 
any individual citizen, and particularly one to whom 
the State already owed so much, for the reflected honor 
of his well-earned reputation. They, nevertheless, re- 
quested Mr. Rinehart to prepare them such, design as 
seemed to him appropriate, and the model of the present 
statue was accordingly sent forward, while the General 
Assembly of 1870 was in session. The engagement of 
Mr. Rinehart and the plan of his work were so accepta- 
ble to the members of both Houses, that an additional 
appropriation of ten thousand dollars was at once made 
for the completion of the monument, according to his 
design, and under the direction of the original commit- 
tee. It would be ungracious not to recognize the liberal 
and most becoming spirit in which this legislative action 
was taken, and its perfect accord with the deep and 
spontaneous feeling which had welcomed the first appro- 
priation. 

The Legislature of 1867, as appears by the Act of that 
date, had contemplated the removal of the remains of 
Chief Justice Taney to the Capital of the State, and the 



334 WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 

erection of the monument above them. The suggestion, 
in itself, was eminently appropriate, for many reasons. 
It was here that, as a student, he had laid the deep and 
broad foundations of his professional learning and suc- 
cess. In the chamber where we meet to-day, to do him 
honor — and to whose historical associations this scene 
will add another, not the least — he sate, for years, a 
Senator of Maryland, the peer of the distinguished men 
who sate around him, when no legislative body in the 
Union surpassed that Senate in dignity, ability, or moral 
elevation. In the Chamber there, above us, where the 
honorable Judges, who join us in this tribute to his 
memory, uphold the ancient credit of the State's Appel- 
late Bench, at the zenith of his reputation as advocate 
and counsel and in the very ripeness of his powers, he 
shone, the leader of the bar of Maryland, its actual not 
less than its official head. And those were days, too, 
when to lead it was to walk in the footsteps of Pinkney 
and be measured by the measure of his genius. If, 
therefore, he had slept beneath this dome, or in its 
shadow, it would have been with the dwelling-places of 
his fame about him, surrounded by the olden and con- 
secrated memories of the State, which was but a revolted 
colony when he was born. 

Bat the wishes of the Chief Justice himself, upon that 
subject, had been too strong and were too sacred, to be 
violated by his children, even for the gratification of the 
public desire. The quiet town of Frederick, the theatre 
of his earlier professional distinction, was hallowed to 
him by the grave of his mother, and when he left it, in 
mid life, for larger spheres of usefulness and honor, he 
exacted the pledge, from those who loved him, that he 
should be laid beside her when he died. Nor was this 
the outbreak of fresh grief or transient sentiment or 
feeling. Through all his life of toil and struggle, am- 






WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 660 

bition, reward and disappointment, it was his dearest 
longing; and there is something inexpressibly touching 
in the wanner and more anxious hope with which the 
world-worn man clung fast to it, as the period drew 
nearer for its consummation. The literature of the 
English tongue has nothing that exceeds in mournful 
tenderness and grace the expression which he gave to 
it, in a letter written but a little while before the pledge 
of friendship was redeemed. Such a feeling — so devoted, 
and cherished for so long — it would have been next to 
sacrilege to disregard, and the Legislature of 1870 re- 
spected it accordingly, by withdrawing from the appro- 
priation of their predecessors and their own all but the 
one condition, which required the monument to be 
erected where it stands. The final selection of that 
locality, with its exposure, rendered it expedient that 
the statue should be cast in bronze, and the Legislature, 
therefore, so directed. 

With the erection of the monument, the prescribed 
duties of the committee which I have the honor to rep- 
resent were substantially ended, but in view of the time 
which must elapse before another session of the General 
Assembly, they have deemed it due to the dignity of 
the occasion respectfully to invite the official interven- 
tion of your Excellency, in delivering tjie finished work 
to the people of the State. It would have been a pleas- 
ure to them, if they could have felt at liberty to antici- 
pate the wishes of the Legislature, or have ventured to 
ask that your Excellency would gratify your own, by 
authorizing a more formal celebration than this quiet 
homestead gathering. 

As a few moments will disclose to us, the artist has 
chosen to present us his illustrious subject in his robes 
of office, as we saw him when he sate in judgment. The 
stature is heroic, but, with that exception, the traits of 



336 WILLIAM HENRY RIXEHART. 

nature are not altered or disguised. The weight of 
years that bent the venerable form has not been light- 
ened, and the lines of care, and suffering, and thought, 
are as life traced them. But, unless the master's hand 
has lost its cunning, we shall see not merely the linea- 
ments we knew, but traces of the soul which illuminated 
and informed them. The figure has been treated by the 
artist in the spirit of that noble and absolute simplicity 
which is the type of the highest order of greatness, and 
is therefore its grandest, though its most difficult ex- 
pression, in art. The sculptor deals easily enough with 
subjects which admit of ornament and illustration, or 
address the passions or the fancy. The graces he can 
lend his work — the smiles with which it wins us — the 
beautiful or joyous images or thoughts with which he 
can surround it — each is to us an open leaf of the fair 
poem which he writes in bronze or marble. Like the 
chorus of a drama, they tell, even for the worst of poets, 
far more than half his story. Another task indeed it is, 
to embody in a single image the expression of a great 
historic life, so that standing severe and apart, it shall 
be its own interpreter, forever, to the generations of 
men. 

The pathway of a great judge does not lead through 
the realms of fancy. Neither in reality nor in retro- 
spect is there much of the flush of imagination upon it 
or about it. With such a career Art cannot deal, nor 
History, as with those brilliant lives, which dazzle while 
they last and are seen only through a halo when they 
are over. The warrior, the orator, the poet — each in 
his way — is linked with the imagination or enthusiasm 
of mankind; and so the broken sword, the unstrung 
lyre, the shattered column with its cypress wreaths, all 
have their voices for the common heart. But the at- 
mosphere of pure intellect and dispassionate virtue, 



WILLIAM HENRY RINE1IART. odT 

serene although it be, is far loo cold for ordinary sympa- 
thies to live in. The high ministers of human justice 
are segregated from their fellows, by their very function, 
which shuts out favor and affection. Fidelity to the 
obligation which withdraws them from the daily inter- 
ests and passions and almost from the converse of 
society, is the patent of their nobility in their great 
office. The loftier the nature the more complete its 
isolation to the general eye — the fewer the throbs which 
answer to its pulses. Such men may be cherished and 
beloved, in the personal and near relations which are 
the dearest blessing of all lives. They may be venerated 
and revered, so that all heads shall be bowed and un- 
covered when they pass. But they go, when life closes, 
into the chamber of heroes, fated to dwell afar off, only, 
in the memories and minds of men. 

When the great citizen whose image is beside us 
walked, in his daily walk, amid our reverence, the sim- 
ple beauty of his private life was all before us. We can 
recall his kindly smile, his open hand, his gracious, 
gentle speech. The elders of our generation will re- 
member how his stormy nature was subdued, by duty 
and religion, to the temperance, humility and patience 
which we knew. All of us saw and wondered how do- 
mestic sorrows, the toils and trials of his station, old 
age, infirmity of body, ingratitude, injustice, persecu- 
tion, still left his intellect unclouded, his courage un- 
subdued, his fortitude unshaken, his calm and lofty 
resignation and endurance descending to no murmur 
nor resentment. These things the sculptor is not called 
to tell to those who shall come after us. The pen of 
the biographer has worthily recorded them, and just 
posterity will read what he has written. The image of 
the Magistrate and Ruler, as the world was wont to see 
him, is all that the chisel bequeaths to immortality — 
28* 



338 WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 

his image, as History shall see it, when, ashamed of the 
passions of our day, she shall he once more reconciled 
with Truth. With this noblest of the tasks of Art, 
only genius may deal fitly — yet genius has dwelt with 
it, and its difficulties, overcome, are the glory and the 
triumph of genius. 

Thus, then, to-day, sir, the State of Maryland, with 
grateful reverence and pride, commemorates a life, than 
which few greater, and none loftier or purer, shall dig- 
nify the annals of our country. It was a life coeval 
with her own, and a part of her own, and she honors 
what she knew. It was a life of patriotism, of duty 
and of sacrifice ; a life whose aim and effort, altogether, 
were to be, and do, and bear, and not to seem. The 
monument her people rear to it is scarcely less her monu- 
ment than his to whom it rises. What changes shall 
roll round it with the rolling seasons; whether it shall 
survive the free institutions of which Taney was the 
worshiper and champion, or shall see them grow in 
stability, security and splendor; whether it shall wit- 
ness the development and beneficent expansion of the 
constitutional system which it was the labor of his life 
and love to understand and to administer, or shall be- 
hold it, 

" Like a circle in the water, 
Which never ctastth to enlarge itself, 
Till, by broad spreading, it disperse to naught" — 

are questions which men will answer to themselves, ac- 
cording to their hopes or fears — according to their trust, 
it may be, in the mercy and providence of God. But 
Maryland has done her part for good, in this at least, 
that she has made imperishable record, for posterity, of 
the great example of her son. She has builded as it 
were a shrine to those high civic qualities and public 
virtues, without which, in their rulers, republics are a 
sham, and freedom cannot long abide among a, people. 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEIIAET. 66\i 

It was, I was about to say, the sad mischance — but, 
in a higher though more painful sense, the privilege 
and fortune — of Chief Justice Taney, io fill his place 
in times of revolution and unparalleled convulsion — 
when blood boiled in the veins of brethren, till it was 
red upon a million hands. In such a crisis, no man so 
conspicuous as he, and yet so bound to shun the rancor 
of the strife, could hope for freedom from distrust and 
challenge. A soul, brave and tenacious as his was — so 
sensitive to duty, and so resolute to do it — provoked 
injustice not to be appeased, and dared reproaches which 
he might not answer. His constitutional opinions were 
already part of the recorded jurisprudence of the coun- 
try, and he could not change them, because the tempest 
was hoAvling. It was the conviction of his life that the 
Government under which we lived was of limited pow- 
ers, and that its Constitution had been framed for war 
as well as peace. Though he died, therefore, he could 
not surrender that conviction at the call of the trumpet. 
He had plighted his troth to the Liberty of the citizen 
and the supremacy of the Laws, and no man could put 
them asunder. 

Whatever might be the right of the people to change 
their Government, or to overthrow it, he believed that 
the duty of the judges was simply to maintain the Con- 
stitution, while it lasted, and, if need were, defend it to 
the death. He knew himself its minister and servant 
only — not its master — commissioned to obey and not to 
alter. He stood, therefore, in the very rush of the tor- 
rent, and, as he was immovable, it swept over him. He 
had lived a life so stainless, that to question his integ- 
rity was enough to beggar the resources of falsehood 
and make even shamelessness ashamed. He had given 
lustre and authority, by his wisdom and learning, to the 
judgments of the Supreme Tribunal, and had presided 



oil) WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 

over its deliberations with a dignity, impartiality and 
courtesy which elevated even the administration of jus- 
tice. Every year of his labors had increased the re- 
spect and affection of his brethren and heightened the 
confidence and admiration of the profession which 
looked up to him as worthily its chief. And yet he 
died, traduced and ostracised, and his image was with- 
held from its place in the chamber which was filled 
already with his fame. 

Against all this, the State of Maryland here registers 
her protest in the living bronze. She records it in no 
spirit of resentment or even of contention, but silently 
and proudly— as her illustrious son, without a word, 
committed his reputation to the justice of his country- 
men. Nor doubts she of the answer that posterity will 
make to her appeal. Already the grateful manhood of 
the people has begun to vindicate itself and him. 
Already, among those whose passion did him wrong, 
the voices of the most eminent and worthy have been 
lifted, in confession of their own injustice and in manly 
homage to his greatness and his virtues. Already the 
waters of the torrent have nearly spent their force, and 
high above them, as they fall, unstained by their pollu- 
tion and unshaken by their rage, stands where it stood, 
in grand and reverend simplicity, the august figure of 
the great Chief Justice ! 

Governor Whvte's Eeply. 

Governor Whyte proceeded to reply from his place. 
He said : 

Accustomed, almost from the cradle, to revere the name 
of Taney as the synonym of all that is just and good, 
I dare not now give utterance to my private feelings, 
but must needs confine myself to the cold formality of 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEHAKT. 



341 



official duty. Maryland had already reared a stately 
column to him who was "first in war, first in peace, 
and first in the hearts of his countrymen,"' and it was 
the duty, as it has been the pleasure of the State, to 
hand down to posterity, as in this memorial of molten 
bronze, an enduring tribute of affection and regard for 
her own illustrious son, upon whose shoulders the 
judicial ermine lay, stainless as the virgin snow. 

In accepting your report and taking the statue into 
the permanent custody of the State, I should be remiss 
in dutv, as its representative, did I not thank you for 
your willing and faithful discharge of the obligation 
laid upon you, and I congratulate the State that your 
voluntary choice of the artist to execute the legislative 
resolve, has fallen upon one of her own honored 
children. In his presence and in advance of the ex- 
position of his finished work, delicacy forbids my 
further comment. 

There must be, I think, general concurrence of senti- 
ment that this is not the appropriate occasion for an 
extended eulogy upon the life and character of the late 
Chief Justice, (if, indeed, a life of "apostolic simplicity" 
be not its own best eulogist,) but it will be my privilege, 
in response to an apparent popular demand, to make 
suggestions to the General Assembly that a proper 
moment and an apt orator be selected to do justice to 
his preeminent judicial services and to commemorate 
his private virtues in the presence of the two Houses, 
in each of which, at times during his long and useful 
life, he was a distinguished actor, and much of whose 
legislation bears the impress of his master-hand. 

Thus, day by day through his life, he carved and 
wrought his way, which was as the beginning of a grand 
jeweled stair-case leading up to the Temple of Fame. 



342 WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 

After this rare triumphal acknowledgment of Eine- 
hart's worth by his own countrymen, he returned to 
Italy. Here he continued his work earnestly and 
steadily. His statues are numerous; that of Clyte, one 
of the most famous, was purchased for the citizens of 
Baltimore by Mr. John W. McCoy. It is now in the 
Peabody Institute. Into this beautiful creation the 
artist seems to have infused the golden glow of that 
olden story with all of its mythological sadness and 
sweetness. Presenting to the mind most vividly the 
lovely spirit of that flower which 

" turns on her god when he sets 
The same look that she turned when he rose." 

The bronze doors at the National Capitol, so noted for 
the beauty of workmanship, were begun by Crawford 
and completed by Einehart at Eome, in fulfillment of 
Crawford's dying request. Four years were required to 
perfect this labor, and the doors were then brought to 
America under his charge. During his stay in Wash- 
ington, he made the statuettes on the clock in the House 
of Eepresentatives. 

Among the creations of this artist is a statue of En- 
dymion, which represents a sleeping boy. In this, 
Kinehart followed the true mythological story. En- 
dymion had received from Jove the gift of perpetual 
youth. The Queen of the Moon, clad in her mantle of 
silver, guarded him in his unbroken sleep for love's 
sake; and while he slept, she watched his flocks and 
made them increase untended by their earthly shepherd. 
Erom the poet we learn 

"How she conveyed him softly in a sleep, 
1 1 is temples bound with poppy, t<> the steep 
Head of old Latinos, where she stoops each night, 
Gilding the mountain with her brother's light, 
To kiss her sweetest." 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 343 

The brave and fond Antigone forms the subject of 
another statue closely uniting the ideal with the real. 
In Rinehart's work we behold the dreams of a poet, 
whose songs*arrested in their upward flight, stand for- 
ever before us in forms of marble. 

Hero, too, whose name has been echoed down the cor- 
ridors of ages, he has not forgotten. She who watched 
for the nightly coining of that lover who finally, 

" Sinking bewildered 'mid the dreary sea," 
came no more. 

Four years would have been necessary to accomplish 
the work awaiting the master-hand when Death over- 
came him. The number of statues completed, as well 
as the busts of many well-known citizens of the United 
States, seems almost incredible to an ordinary mind. 

The subjects chosen from the mythical legends of 
Greece and Eome, seem to have responded best to the 
bent of his peculiar genius. It was his delight to wan- 
der in fancy amid the shadowy realms of ancient days, 
peopled by races that to us might seem only as the gods 
and goddesses of mythology, were it not for the remnants 
of glorious temples and statues, left scattered in the 
pathway of destroying Time. So, occasionally comes 
suddenly into our midst one who seems of that lost 
people who moved familiarly amongst the creations of 
perfected Art— the children of Music, of Sculpture, of 
Poetry : 

" The fair humanities of old religion, 
The Power, the Beauty and the Majesty 
That had their haunts in dale or piny mountain, 
Or forest, by slow stream, or pebbly spring, 
Or chasms and watery depths; 
• Spirits or gods that used to share this earth 
With man as with their friend." 



344 WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 

This is but a poor recital of the arduous life-labors of 
an artist. The writer of this sketch performs the lesser 
work of wrapping about the pedestal upon which rests 
the statue, a drapery whose warm tints ma} 7 , in some 
degree, throw forth the strong, pure outlines of the 
snowy marble. The better work is left for a bolder 
pen to accomplish. 

Overtaxed in mind and body, Einehart fell a victim 
to that merciless disease — consumption. Following the 
wish of his physician lie repaired to Switzerland, hoping 
to obtain relief from the baths of Sodon. The progress 
of the disease, however, could not be arrested; it did its 
work rapidly and surely. His death took place at Eome 
on the 28th day of October, 1874. He left messages of 
love, and tokens of regard and remembrance to friends, 
many of whom were young artists. He was a quiet, un- 
assuming man, of a strong, deep nature. An artist-poet 
in temperament, and unchanging in his attachments. 
There is a touching story told of the artist's affection 
for a lady whom he outlived. It may be a romance 
fashioned for the occasion, yet it wears the hallowed 
pathos of a sacred truth; and the tender beauty of a 
perfect love. 

By his last will and testament, Einehart bequeaths to 
each of his brothers, five in number, the sum of $2,000. 
The remainder of his estate he directs to be made use 
of for the benefit and advancement of Art. This por- 
tion of his will is as follows : 

u Third. Being desirous of aiding in the promotion of 
a more highly cultivated taste for art among the people 
of my native State, and of assisting young men in the 
study of the art of sculpture who may desire to make it 
a profession, but having at the present time no definite 
plan in view for the accomplishment of these objects, I 
give, devise and bequeath all the rest and residue of my 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 345 

estate, real, personal and mixed, and wheresoever situ- 
ated, unto my two personal friends, William T. Walters 
and Benjamin F. Newcomer, of the city of Baltimore, or 
the survivor of them, or the heirs, executors, or admin- 
istrators of such survivor, in trust and confidence, with 
the injunction that the whole of said residue of my estate? 
or the proceeds thereof, shall be devoted and appropri- 
ated by them, according to their best judgment and 
discretion, to the promotion of the objects and purposes 
named above. 

"And if, in the opinion of my said trustees, this can 
be best accomplished by any concert of action with the 
trustees of the Peabody Institute, or by the establishment 
of a professorship in connection with the gallery of art, 
which, at some future time, is to be provided for by that 
corporation, or by the investment of any portion of the 
funds so held by them in trust, and aiding, from the 
income derived from such investment, deserving young 
men who are desirous of pursuing their studies abroad, 
but are without the means of doing so, they, my said 
trustees, are at liberty to adopt any or all or none of 
these methods, or to transfer the trust, or the estate so 
held by them in trust, to any corporation which, in their 
judgment, would best serve the purposes indicated." 

As justice should be the meed of justice, the following 
honest truths, extracted from the " Baltimore Sun," will 
bear reprinting upon this occasion : 

"The art culture of Great Britain has, in ten years, 
added twenty-five per cent, to the earning capacity of 
the industry of the country. While so much has been 
accomplished in England, and scarcely less in France 
and Germany, the United States, with the exception of 
such admirable institutions as the Maryland Institute 
School of Design, and the like school in the Cooper In- 
stitute of New York, and a few others, has almost stood 
29 



346 WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 

still. The beneficent influence of the Maryland Insti- 
tute school upon different branches of industry and the 
practical work of life in its various forms in this city 
will be readily conceded by all. Yet it is a curious fact 
that in the ' Circulars of Information of the Bureau of 
Education, No. 2, 1874/ issued from the Department of 
the Interior, Washington, and which professes to give 
the facts as to ' drawing in public schools ; the present 
relation of art to education in the United States/ there 
is not a solitary allusion to the facilities afforded for 
that object in Maryland. The report informs us that 
Massachusetts was the first State to provide for such 
training in the public schools, a law having been passed 
to that effect in 1870. We are informed of schools for 
the practical teaching of art as applied to industry and 
manufactures in various Massachusetts towns, in New 
York, Philadelphia, and Cincinnati ; of schools of art 
in various parts of the North and West, and there is not 
one word of the Maryland Institute School of Design, 
nor of what other Maryland schools have done in the 
same direction, within a distance of only forty miles 
from Washington. The Maryland Institute has been in 
operation over twenty-six years, and has male and female 
classes, who are not only taught industrial drawing, but 
art proper, and it was here that the famous sculptor, 
Rinehart, who has attained a world-wide reputation, re- 
ceived his primary training. 

"Drawing has been also taught in the female high 
schools of the city for over ten years, as well as in the 
Baltimore City College for boys. The private collec- 
tions of paintings and statuary in Baltimore are proba- 
bly surpassed by those of no other city in the Union, 
and yet here we have a public document sent from 
the Department of the Interior, Washington, for the 
'information' of the American people on this subject, 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 347 

which announces to the public what has been done far 
out in New England and Northern States, in ' South 
Bend,' Indiana, and even in San Francisco, and has no 
* information ' of what has been so long and so nobly 
accomplished in Baltimore, right under its own eyes. 

"It is a pity that as much cannot be said of the country 
at large. The United States in 1848 was at the foot of 
the competitors in industrial art, and was little or no 
better off at the French exhibition of 1868. The atten- 
tion of our people should be more directed to this sub- 
ject, and the example of England in this regard be 
emulated. Industrial art should find a place in our 
public schools, and it is satisfactory that such a move- 
ment is being made. Some productions of American 
industry may be indicative of the results that flow from 
the neglect of cultivating art in its industrial forms." 

William H. Kinehart was about forty-eight years of 
age at the time of his death. His mortal remains were, 
according to his own request, brought to his native 
land. His funeral took place in the city of Baltimore, 
on Saturday, January 2d, 1875. 

Wreaths and garlands of rare flowers, together with 
the suggestive laurel-leaves, were sent as a last tribute 
from friends even so far away as Italy. The casket in 
which his body was placed, was borne by S. Teackle 
Wallis, A. J. H. Way, W. T. Walters, Arthur Quartley, 
John W. McCoy, Frank B. Mayer, B. F. Newcomer, 
Edwin F. Abel, Edward G-. McDowell, Hugh Sisson, 
John R. Cox and G. H. Hunt. 

The funeral services were performed at the West- 
minster Presbyterian Church. A memorial address 
was made by the pastor, the Reverend D. C. Marquis. 
Here is a portion of it : 

" There is much to always be learned from the record 
of an earnest, laborious, honorable life. It is both 



34S WILLIAM HENRY RINEIIART. 

pleasant and profitable to dwell upon the history of one 
who has achieved greatness, eminence and an honorable 
fame by the force of natural genius, directed by patient, 
persevering, untiring labor: 

" Lives of great men all remind us 

We may make our lives sublime, 
And departing, leave behind us 

Footprints in the sands of time." 

I could wish that some one better qualified than my- 
self had undertaken the task of paying a worthy tribute 
to the memory of Einehart. Tor his is a name that 
belongs not to Baltimore alone, nor to Maryland, nor to 
America, but to the world. I shall not attempt to assign 
his niche in the Temple of Fame, or to give him his true 
place or rank among the devotees of art. I know too 
little of such matters to presume to speak concerning 
them with understanding or authority. Neither do I 
feel called upon to describe his personal character, to 
extol his virtues or to excuse his faults; for, not having 
had the honor and the pleasure of his acquaintance 
during life, I could not speak from personal knowledge, 
and therefore would prefer to lay all personality aside. 
There are some things of a more general -character, 
however, which I can with propriety say on this occasion. 
I shall say them for the benefit of the living as well as 
in honor of the dead. 

The brief but brilliant career of Einehart is a proof 
that excellence is the result of labor. The old Latin 
proverb "Nulla excellentia sine lahcre" is a lesson that 
needs to be impressed upon the young men of this gen- 
eration. Some whom God has blessed with native talent 
rely upon their genius, and failure tells them of their 
error when too late to apply the remedy. Others sup- 
posing that excellence is altogether due to the easy , 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEHART. 349 

flights of genius, and acknowledging their own defi- 
ciency in this regard, settle down content with medi- 
ocrity, omitting all earnestness of effort, never rousing 
their energies to the struggle, 

But here was a man who carved his way to the front 
rank in his profession by earnest, patient, unremitting ' 
labor. H is native talen t was undoubtedly of the highest 
order. His genius pointed the way and gave form and 
shape to the bright ideal that became the goal to which 
he struggled to attain. But after all, the secret of suc- 
cess, the subtle charm that lifted him above discourage- 
ment and made him superior to defects, was simply hard 
work. The man who has a genius for faithful, honest 
work will make his name known and his influence felt 
by his generation. It is patient, persevering, enduring 
labor that makes men great, 

The beautiful creations of the sculptor's chisel are 
the monuments that perpetuate his fame. But you and 
I, no less truly than he, are rearing monuments that 
shall live a] specimens of our handiwork after Ave are 
gone. The influence we exert, the power we wield for 
good or ill, the impress we leave upon the character, 
and the touch that gives direction to the lives of those 
around us or those who are coming after us— all these 
are monuments that will speak for us or against us when 
we ourselves are cold in death. Let us see to it, then, 
that every influence of ours shall tend to the creation 
of shapes of moral beauty that shall minister pleasure 
to all beholders. No matter what may be our position 
or profession, the influence Ave exert will live after us. 
We can make it appear in form more beautiful than the 
most perfect figures of marble or of bronze, for Ave can 
be the instruments in reproducing the likeness of Christ, 
and of fitting immortal souls for the companionship of 
heaven. 



350 WILLIAM HENRY RINEIIART. 

The busiest life, the life that seems most important 
and that has most work before it, is no security against 
the approach of death. Here was a man who, by long 
years of patient labor, had just attained that position 
where he could accomplish most in his profession. In 
the prime of life and with the period of most effective 
work before him, he must lie down and die. The world 
feels the loss, especially in that higher realm of art 
where the few are privileged to walk. But here are 
scores of busy men from all the walks of prokssional 
and commercial life — some just struggling up to a posi- 
tion of effective usefulness, and others with standing 
fairly won are prepared to accomplish more in the years 
to come than has been achieved in all the past. But 
are you prepared for all the possible contingencies of the 
journey ? Have you counted on the probability of death ? 
Man of thirty, forty, fifty years, have yon met this -ques- 
tion and settled it for yourself? Don't imagine your 
life to be so important that it must last until you think 
your work is done. Get ready for death and you are 
ready for anything. Get ready for death and you are 
already more thoroughly equipped for life's work. For 
that man only is prepared to live who is well prepared 
to die. 

"Life is real, life is earnest, 
And the grave is not its goal, 

'Dust thou art, to dust returnest' 
Was not spoken of the soul." 

Until an appropriate resting-place should be chosen, 
Rinehart's remains were placed in the family vault of 
Mr. AV. T. Walters, one of his earliest friends and bene- 
factors. Here in the " shadow of his own beautiful art 
creations," they left him in the chill of a winter's day. 
Here, " Love reconciled with Death," keeps silent and 
unbroken vigilance over the dead. The flowers which 



WILLIAM HENRY RINEIIART. 



351 



we drop upon a grave are testimonies of love or respect 
cine to the doer of good deeds, and faithful work on 
earth. Many who are hurrying onward towards the 
final goal, seeing these flowers, may stop and ponder — 
and a few will learn. 




THE DYING GIRL TO HER LOVER, 

A SONG. 



TOO late, ah ! dearest one, too late, 
Thou comest to thiue own again; 
Alas ! to die is my sad fate, 

Why, why must bliss thus eud in pain ; 
They parted us — ah ! doom too sure 

To leave me thus in grief to pine ! 
Thy fondness now eau ne'er restore 

This pale and wasted form of mine. 

But better thus at life's last hour, 

To know that thou dost love me ttlll, 
Thau linger on, a filled flower, 

Touched by a blight that could not kill. 
Fast fade those features, dear, of thine, 

No more I mark thy anxious eye, 
Then press thy warm sweet l ; ps to mine, 

And let me thus in rapture die. 

George Hay Ringgold, 

United States Anny. 



THE AUTHOR OF "EMILY CHESTER " 




NNE MONCURE CRAKE was born in the 
City of Baltimore, January 7th, 1838. She 
was the daughter of William Crane, an emi- 
nent merchant of that cit} r . The great-great- 
great-grandfather of William Crane was Jasper Crane, 
who settled in Newark, New Jersey, in 1666. He was 
afterward made first Magistrate of the City of Newark. 
His only son was Azariah Crane, who married Mary 
Treat, the daughter of Governor Robert Treat, who, in 
the well-known Charter Oak affair, withstood Sir Ed- 
mund Androas. The mother of Anne Moncnre Crane 
was a member of the Stone family. The founder of this 
family in Maryland was the Honorable William Stone, 
the third Governor of the Province, and a supporter of 
the policy of Lord Baltimore during the usurpation of 
Cromwell. Thomas Stone, the grandson of Governor 
William Stone, and the youngest of the signers of the 
Declaration of Independence, was the grandfather of 
Mrs. Crane and the great-grandfather of Anne Moncure 
Crane. Miss Crane was a woman of strong features, 
luxuriant hair, and dark eyes. Her mouth, though 
large, wore a pleasant and intelligent expression. Her 
face indicated by its force somewhat of the capability 
as well as the intensity of her nature. Under the 



354 ANNE MONCURE CRANE. 

guidance of the Beverend N. A. Morrison her education 
was mainly directed. 

She graduated in the year 1855. When about twenty 
years of age, in 1858, she began the story of Emily Ches- 
ter. Urged on and sustained by a certain inspiration, 
she completed the work that won her first reputation as 
an author. When finished, the novel was put quietly 
away, nor was the manuscript produced for publication 
until five years had gone by. The story of "Emily 
Chester" was published by Messrs. Ticknor & Fields, 
without other greater recommendation than its own 
words, the representatives of an intellectual vigor only 
half revealed. "In a short space of time ten editions 
were required. In addition to these, four rival editions 
were brought out in England — while a translation, pub- 
lished at Leipzic, met with a most appreciative reception 
from the countrymen of Goethe." 

Of this work Mrs. Forrester says : " It was published 
without a word of preface to give the least hint of the 
whereabouts of the author, and was not covered with 
the pall of * Great Southern Novel,' as is usually the 
mode in which novels by Southern writers are an- 
nounced." 

The opening scenes of this book, and some that are 
most interesting, are placed in Maryland. It has been 
said that the characters are drawn from life. Whether 
they be drawn from individual lives or otherwise, they 
are delineated with a bold and masterly hand, equal to 
the task. In "Emily Chester," the author is said to 
have idealized herself. " Certainly," exclaimed a friend 
of that writer, " the glorious hair that crowned the head 
of Emily Chester belonged to Anne Crane." The Hon. 
George II. Hilliard concludes a review of the book in 
these words : 

" From the first chapter the author seizes the at ten- 



ANNE MONCURE CRANE. OOO 

tion with the strong grasp of Genius, and holds it 
unbroken to the last. And when the end comes we lay 
the book down with a sort of sigh of relief at the 
relaxation of fibers stretched to a painful degree of 
tension." 

Gail Hamilton tells us that she does not know that 
American novel-literature has produced any other work 
of the kind. 

When the author of this book was discovered to be 
Miss Crane, her companionship was sought and culti- 
vated by many who, owing to her student-life of seclu- 
sion, had scarcely known of her existence before. So 
does talent raise its possessor above the level of less 
gifted mortals. 

In November of 1867, "Opportunity — A Novel by 
the Author of Emily Chester," was given to the world. 
This, too, is a Maryland story. The added experience 
of several years, a profounder thought and wider knowl- 
edge gained thereby, marks this book more as a child 
of the brain than of the heart. 

The freshness of a first strong effort wins and holds 
the attention in the story of Emily Chester that speaks 
to and of the heart rather than the brain. When Paul 
Hay ne, the poet, tells us of the heroine of " Oppor- 
tunity," that " she is little more than a girl in years, 
but her heart and intellect are strangely precocious," we 
are strongly reminded of the author of " Emily Chester," 
of whom the same words might have been written. 

On the 23d of September, 1869, Miss Crane became 
the wife of Mr. Agustus Seemiiller, a wealthy merchant 
of New York, a gentleman of intelligence and culture. 
For three years after her marriage Mrs. Seemiiller re- 
sided in the city of New York. In April, of the year 
1871, her third book saw the light. It was entitled 
"Reginald Archer." It was written in New York 



356 ANNE MONCURE CRANE. 

while the great sad life of that wonderful city surged 
about her lesser life then near. to its goal. In reply to a 
friend who asked r " What could have induced you to 
write such a book?" She answered, "Since I have 
lived in New York, I have learned of such fearful 
things, that had I not written this book, the very 
stones would have cried out against me!" This book 
has met with much censure, and in some cases has been 
wholly condemned as in, moral. It must be admitted 
that the general tone of this book would seem to be 
rather demoralizing than elevating in its tendencies. 
Yet it was, doubtless, the purpose of the writer to give 
only "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the 
truth." The faithful writer is as a missioner to the 
world. Those darker sins that blast the hope and peace- 
fulness of life, and damn souls for eternity, we should 
be taught to hate and fear. Yet the beautiful things 
that God has given should be more frequently and 
brightly portrayed, to lead us from the lower paths 
upwards. "Reginald Archer" contains some sweet 
truths as well as bitter ones. It would have been 
better, perhaps, had the bitterer ones been left more to 
the imagination — some pure minds and hearts might 
thus be saved from a hateful knowledge not otherwise 
learned. 

Here are a few extracts from " Reginald Archer ;" 
they are selected by one who, turning the leaves, takes 
from this and that what " seemeth to me the best." 

"There is another aspect of the subject, which Christ 
glorified forever when he took little children in his arms 
and blessed them : and it seems, at times, that we would 
do well to take our own childhood in our arms, and let 
it bless us ; going back to those innocent early days 
when we were both good and glad." — Page 1. 

" It is not David, poet and singer of Israel, not Solo- 



ANNE MONCURE CRANE. 357 

mon, wisest of men, not Moses, prince, hero and law- 
giver, but it is Jacob, who loved one woman, and served 
for her fourteen years, which ' were but as a single day 
for the love that he bore her ;' whose tenderness and 
devotion increased down to old age; who cherished her 
children after her as he did nothing else in existence; 
and who, as his own end drew near, passed over the 
events of his life to talk of Rachel, and her death and 
burial. His love for her seems the one flower and bloom 
of his nature, gaining a strange beauty and strength 
from the very barrenness of the remainder of his being. 
His faults were many; but recalling that rare example 
of faithful devotion, which still lives fair and lovely 
in the world's heart and recollection, verily, women, 
at least, should judge him leniently and tenderly." — 
Page 7. 

These words of Annie Crane's are assuredly drawn 
from a depth of pure inspiration. Could the writer of 
them have purposed aught, save what is good ! " He 
was not a romantic man; he had no idea of passing for 
a hero ; not the least intention of doing or saying fine 
things, or putting them into well-sounding sentences; 
but as he walked doggedly up the street, with his head 
down and his hat half over his eyes, bitterly arguing the 
case with himself, he was fighting upon the most terri- 
ble of battle-grounds — and that on which we contend 
with invisible forces, that on which souls, not bodies, 
are slain. This conflict comes to the noblest and truest 
as surely as to the feeble and degenerate; and we learn 
from it that virtue means literally manhood — the power 
to fight, to struggle, and even to die, rather than weakly 
and basely surrender our natures to foes without or 
within. According to the measures of our defeat or 
victory, we stand before our consciences and Our God : 
we know that we are cowards and weaklings, or brave, 



358 ANNE MONCURE CRANE. 

true men and women. There is no reversing this deci- 
sion to ourselves or to others. It stands fatally recorded 
against us." — Page 71. 

" I sometimes wonder that women ever cease praying. 
To me there is no truer touch of genius in that inimi- 
table story of ' The Newcomes,' than where the author 
speaks of Laura Pendennis as ' engaged where pious 
women ever betake themselves in moments of doubt, of 
grief, of pain, of separation, of joy even, or whatsoever 
other trial. They have but to will, and, as it were, an 
invisible temple rises around them; their hearts can 
kneel down there, and they can have an audience with 
the great, the merciful, the untiring Counsellor and 
Consoler."— Page 98. 

A few months after the publication of this work the 
author departed with her husband to Europe. Her 
perfect knowledge of the languages and literature of 
Germany, France and Italy, doubly endeared to her 
those far-off lands. Her health having become enfee- 
bled she was taken to the baths of Ems and Baden, and 
finally to the city of Stuttgart, Wurtemberg. This 
quaint capital of "old romance," with its lordly castle, 
its grim walls, its vineyards and gardens lies in the valley 
of the Neckar. "We can imagine the soothing influence 
of such a scene upon the heart of the weary invalid ; the 
breeze, that to others was only a breeze, may have been 
laden for her with strange whispers from those shadowy 
old ruins, that looking down on the men of to-day are 
as the silent monitors of a past time ; and the Neckar, 
that Suabian stream that, with a heart full of stories, 
hurries on to the Ehine, may it not have sent to her mur- 
murs of its own that her watchers could not under- 
stand ? Although the genial climate and the waters of 
the Kaunstadt are noted for their curative properties 
the fatal disease could not be arrested. Vain were the 



ANNE MONCURE CRANE. 359 

efforts of mortals against the power of Death, which is 
only subservient to that greatest Power — the Omnipo- 
tent God. 

Anne Crane Seemiiller died on the 10th day of De- 
cember, 1873. Mr. Augustus Seemiiller, the husband 
of the novelist, died of heart disease at Paris, France, 
September the 25th, 1875. 

One who is near to her in ties of kinship and love 
thus writes of Anne Crane Seemiiller : 

" Her life was a quiet domestic one, with very little 
of change or incident in it; but her vivid imagination, 
extended reading, intense love of music, and above all, the 
deep religious feeling which pervaded her whole life are 
shown in the books upon which she lavished so much 
of her short earthly existence." 

If we would have the work of our life judged by justest 
judges and critics, let us choose rather those who look 
at the intention before the result. The action is the 
motive-power to the intention, both combining towards 
the result, which does not, alas! always achieve the 
purpose desired by the worker. For the want of per- 
fection, perhaps, in all its parts, the union is incomplete, 
and so the work does not move onward in the tri- 
umphant manner dreamed of by the doer of the work, 
whatever it may be. Another comes who remodels and 
makes more nearly perfect the whole, fulfilling the 
design of the original architect — following the inten- 
tion and accomplishing the result, and this one gains 
the applause due to the designer of the masterpiece. 

Moulded, perhaps, by a depth of love not perceptible 
nor comprehensible to the less heroic nature, this gifted 
woman may have thought to render crime odious by 
telling of it in her own plain fashion rather than adorn- 
ing it in that seductive language used by many who have 
escaped so harsh a lashing from the pen of the critic. 



360 ANNE MONCURE CRANE. 

There are some passages in the books of Anne See- 
miiller that wear the undented beauty of pnre-hearted- 
ness. If she failed in her noble purpose while portray- 
ing the darker sins of life, for which the men and 
women of "good society" are more answerable than 
those of a lower grade, she at least may not have been 
altogether untruthful in 'her bold attempt. It is bet- 
ter to be brave than stealthy. Though the help of the 
coast-guard may not be needed in mid-ocean, there are 
often dangerous rocks and eddies near to the most beau- 
tiful land. These common-place words admit of an 
easy translation. Let those who read wisely look to 
the wiser portion of the story, banish from memory 
that which is unpalatable to the fastidious taste, take to 
their hearts those holier precepts of Truth, and acting 
as coast-guards shield with the strength of their life 
those who cannot see the dangerous rocks and eddies. 




POEMS 



SELECTED FROM THE MANUSCRIPT OF 
THE LATE FREDERICK PINKNEY. 



NOT AS THE TKAVELER. 



Not as the traveler with imploring eyes, 
Within the streamless deserts' burning sand, 

Beholds the rain-cloud rushing through the skies 
To nourish with its freight some distant land j 

Bather like those their devious way who lose 
Amidst a wilderness of starry flowers, 

And make glad pause uncertain what to choose, 
While lightly pass away uncounted hours, 

I linger with thee, dearest, and my gaze 
Upon thee dwells, the gentle and the fair, 

With whom the May of life as yet delays, 
And pure from earthly stain as upper air ; 

And as I gaze with mingled love and pride, 
Feeling at length I have not hoped in vain, 

And clasp the hand for which so many sighed, 
I know that I have done with grief and pain. 



(303) 



364 



SELECTED POEMS 



WHEN TIME MALIGNANTLY SHALL BRING. 



When time malignantly shall bring 

Sorrows to menace or o'ershade, 
Think not thine year has lost its spring, 

And Death a promised boon delayed ; 
Unwise dejection will prolong 

The very empire that we hate, 
Our terrors make a tyrant strong 

That else would fail or abdicate. 

'Tis seldom that such hurt can be 

From suffering, accident, or crime, 
That mind becomes but memory 

Of one event, one point of time, 
A voice that mourns a single blow, 

Unheeding comfort, threats, alarm, 
A clock whose stirless fingers shew 

The very moment of its harm. 

Life is the evergreen whose birth 

Is in a land of summer skies, 
A leaf, a bough may fall to earth 

But younger verdure will arise, 
Pleasures may perish or may wane, 

Be cast away like childhood's toys, 
But others of great price remain, 

And all but yield to purer joys. 



SELECTED POEMS. 



3fi:» 



LOVE ALONE. 



In Eastern climes a gift of flowers, 
With mystic eloquence arrayed, 

By blended tints, holds different powers, 
To taunt, to threaten, to upbraid. 

To me, though it interprets thought, 
Such dreary fancies are unknown, 

And with a single meaning fraught 
It speaks of love, and love alone. 



>S0 



&6 SELECTED POEMS. 



SING ME NOT THAT STRAIN. 



Oh, sing me not that strain, 

Its wild and mournful numbers 
Will rouse the grief again 

That for a moment slumbers ; 
When first 'twas sung by one 

I fain would not remember, 
Hope was a summer's sun 

Where now is bleak December. 

'Tis long since first I strove 

All vain regret to smother, 
Forgetting her whose love 

Is given to another ; 
And oft there is an hour, 

Like this which now I treasure, 
When memory loses power 

And life again has pleasure. 

The heart oppressed with ill 

Is not by joy forsaken, 
In ruined gardens still 

In spring some flowers awaken ; 
But sing me not that strain, 

Its wild and mournful numbers 
Will rouse the grief again 

That for a moment slumbers. 



SELECTED POEMS. 367 



THE FAREWELL WORD. 



The farewell word is breathed, and now 

Adieu to happy home, 
Our gallant barque with rapid prow 

Casts 'round the flashing foam, 
Away, we seek the gem-like isles 

That stud the Eastern main, 
Yet while my comrades know but smiles 

My thoughts are thoughts of pain. 

There's one who for my sake will note 

With tearful, anxious eye, 
The sunlit clouds that stirless float 

Within the placid sky ; 
Shall tremble when the fragile flower 

Scarce shivers in the breeze, 
And deem remorseless winds have power 

Upon the glooming seas. 

Yet absence has not much of ill, 

Unless 'tis joined by fear, 
For hope remains unfaltering still 

To promise and to cheer ; 
Away, upon the heaving deep, 

Our foamy track we cleave, 
AVhen others have forgot to weep 

'Tis feebleness to grieve. 



368 SELECTED POEMS. 



FAIN WOULD I MY GRIEF DISSEMBLE. 



In my eyes the tear-drops tremble 

Which I study to repress, 
Fain would I my grief dissemble 

That thine own may be the less. 

Heeding nought that may befall me, 
Sick in heart, in spirit tame, 

I must go where chance shall call me, 
Casting from me choice and aim. 

I have wrecked my bark, swift-faring 
To the spot where I would guide, 

And upon a raft despairing 
Drift, the sport of wind and tide. 

Henceforth lonely and forsaken, 
Hope and pleasure at an end, 

Joy no more I strive to waken, 
Nor with evil dare contend. 

Why with thankless toil re-kindle 
The cold fragments of a fire, 

But to view its splendor dwindle, 
And with quick decay expire ? 



1840. 



SELECTED POEMS. 369 



A VANISHED JOY. 



The leafless tree again may bear 

Its mellow stores of fruit, 
Some skillful hand may yet repair 

The warped and stringless lute ; 
But fortunes that are once o'erthrown 

We seldom can restore, 
And if our happiness be flown, 

It visits us no more. 

By some old tree we yet may trace 

Where forests cast their shade, 
By broken shaft and crumbling base 

The stately colonnade ; 
But not a token shall appear 

Of joys that once depart, 
And bootless is the task to cheer 

The crushed and gloomy heart. 

The Pagan might his idols hide 

Beneath the ravaged fane, 
And hope in victory and pride 

To bring them forth again ; 
Still might he view in faith and prayer 

Where once they stood enshrined ; 
But vain our dream, and vain our care, 

A vanished joy to find. 



August 25. 1854. 



370 SELECTED POEMS, 



ABIDE WITH ME. 



Abide with me ; the night is round me falling, 
The way, the light, the life deign Thou to be, 

Still in Thy pity hear the suppliant calling, 
Saye or I perish; Lord, abide with me! 

Within the broken heart make Thou Thy dwelling, 
Rescue the lost one, set the captive free, 

To hope and faith by unbonght grace compelling, 
Stay in Thy mercy ; Lord, abide with me ! 

Trust I in self ? Thy saving cross forsaken, 
And my own strength shall like a shadow flee, 

The slumbering tempter shall again awaken, 
Leave not the feeble, Lord, abide with me ! 

Guilty and sin-stained, yet thine aid imploring, 
Thou in my weakness wilt my succor be, 

Trembling, unworthy, hoping and adoring, 
Let me still cry, Oh, Lord, abide with me. 

Monday, July 21, 1872. 



SELECTED POEMS. 



371 



IN DARKNESS. 



In darkness I the strife prolong, 
The dust with Him who gave it breath, 

By evil passions rendered strong, 
Although my victory is death. 

Rejecting when I should adore, 

And struggling while I wish defeat, 

My stubborn efforts I deplore, 
And fain would worship at Thy feet. 

For me I know that Thou hast died, 
For me the atoning blood was spilt, 

Repentance has not vanquished pride, 
Though loathing, still I cling to guilt. 

The rocks were rent, light rushed away, 
The grieving earth was veiled in gloom, 

The dead resumed their mortal clay, 
All nature trembled at Thy doom. 

Yet I, its object and its cause, 

With beating heart and faltering will, 

Although Thy pity towards Thee draws, 
Reject the proffered mercy still. 

I yield at length — Creator, Lord, 
And crucified Redeemer thou, 

God-head and Man, Incarnate Word, 
All-suppliant I before Thee bow. 



372 SELECTED POEMS. 

From all delusion I am free, 

None can oppress when Thou art nigh, 
And he who shall believe in Thee 

Thy word has said shall never die. 

By faith instructed, let me found 
My mansion firmly on the rock, 

The swollen floods may rage around, 
Unshaken it abides the shock. 




Preface 5 

An Introductory Chapter 9 

Daniel Dulany 20 

Thomas Johnson 43 

Charles Carroll, of Carrollton 77 

The Most Reverend John Carroll 103 

Charles Wilson Peale 1 2:1 

Margaret Jane Ramsay 110 

General Mordecai Gist 147 

Otho Holland Williams 15S 

William Pinkney 1 79 

Edward Coote Pinkney 22S 

Francis Scott Key 236 

Amelia B. Welby 284 

Frederick Pinkney. .- 393 

George H. Miles 300 

General Arnold Elzey 309 

Address of Captain Thomas 3] 9 



*. 



374 CONTENTS. 

PaGK. 

William Henry Rinehart 329 

Anne Moncure Crane 353 



POEM8. 

The Raven 39 

Fair Maryland 70 

Evening Hymn 102 

When Soft Stars 122 

'Tis Absence Proves 139 

The American Sword 14G 

My Own Native Land 157 

Oh ! Would I Were with Thee Forever ! 178 

The Pirate's Song. 226 

A Health 234 

Bird-Song. . . . 282 

The Watch 291 

ToS 299 

Coming at Last 307 

A Prayer for Peace 320 

The Dying Girl to her Lover 352 

Poems Selected from the Manuscript of the late Frederick 

Pinkney 301 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




014 367 800 3 



